


part of your world

by Lady_Kaos



Category: Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas (2003), The Little Mermaid - All Media Types, The Road to El Dorado (2000)
Genre: Alternate Universe - The Little Mermaid Fusion, Gen, Idiots in Love, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:48:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 24,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23177227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Kaos/pseuds/Lady_Kaos
Summary: A mer prince desperate for adventure, a human princess who has to outmaneuver her kingdom's power-hungry high priest, and a very disgruntled octopus.Oh, and the chaos goddess out to rule land and sea, who foolishly thinks these idiots are the perfect pawns for her game.Or: a Little Mermaid fusion.
Relationships: Chel/Miguel/Tulio (Road to El Dorado), Miguel/Tulio (Road to El Dorado)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 34





	1. in mysterious fathoms

**Author's Note:**

> A little piece for another project that grew way, way out of hand.
> 
> ...I regret nothing.

**1\. in mysterious fathoms**

_"I'll tell you a tale of the bottomless blue. And it's hey to the starboard, heave ho! Look out, lad, a mermaid be waitin' for you, in mysterious fathoms below."_

Definitely one of the cleaner sea shanties Chel's ever heard. Most of this crew is foreign, and think it suits a princess' sensibilities to keep their language just as proper. But the melody rolls just as well with the waves, so she just grins and inhales that fresh, salty air. The spray kisses her face as she leans over. It's a feeling almost like flying, a sensation that belongs for a true adventure, and not just a voyage home from diplomatic disaster.

"Isn't this great?" she asks her closest friend. "The salty sea air, the wind blowing in your face, a perfect day to be at sea?"

Altivo nickers his agreement and sticks his head out further, mane and tail blowing free in the breeze. How can she keep him locked up in that dingy stall in the hold, when the deck has all _this?_

Besides, Chel is a princess, and this ship has dealt with Altivo loose since they first disembarked for the Southern Isles. It's too late for anyone to complain about it now.

"A fine wind and a following sea," a sailor remarks, as if her words were for him and not the stallion. "King Triton must be in a friendly-type mood."

Chel knows her kingdom's deities by heart. The folklore of the sea is a new one. "King Triton?"

"Why, ruler of the merpeople, your majesty! Every good sailor knows about him!"

Manoa's sailors speak of the Rain God and the Feathered Serpent, but most importantly the callous Lord of the Wide Waters. "And by 'merpeople' you mean fish-people?"

"Quite right, princess!" another sailor chimes in. "Beautiful young maids like yourself on top, scaly tail on the bottom. Their songs will charm ships to dash themselves upon the rocks or for men to climb aboard into their loving, drowning arms."

"King Triton rules the sea and everything in it!" butts in the first. "He's far more than just a fish man! The doldrums are his moping and the storms his fury. But his good moods make the affable winds and the gentle waves. So we try to speak well of him, so he don't drown us for speakin' ill."

Chel grins eagerly, making herself comfy against the rail. The sailors compete with each other for her favor, with ever more grandiose stories of a mermaid court and the golden palace of Atlantica. Absently, she'll toss Altivo an apple when he butts her for one. Otherwise the sea and the sailors have her entirely.

Mermaids and sea kings are vastly preferable to the problems waiting on shore, all around Tzekel-Kan and his zealous attempts to build their nation into an _empire._ Not that any of the Southern Isles' simpering princes are worth the weight of the offered alliance, let alone giving up her succession rights to her little brothers.

Her parents will take her flat refusal of any such match with gentle understanding.

The high priest will hopefully have the grace to drop dead of his rage-induced heart attack.

* * *

"M.... Miguel, would it kill you to slow down!"

Miguel guiltily slams to a halt. Tulio slams right into him. Which is fine. His partner provides something solid to cling on to, with all eight legs, as he regains his breath.

"Oops! Sorry, Tulio, I just got... a bit carried away." The merman pats him apologetically, before he suddenly seizes Tulio in excitement. But that's okay. Not like an octopus can be squeezed all that easily. "And, look, there it is. Isn't it fantastic?"

Tulio cynically appraises the sunken ship. "Eh. We've plundered bigger. Now let's get what we need and get out of here."

The mer prince laughs like the adorable, sheltered royal he is. "Tulio, you can't rush a good adventure."

"You can in shark-infested waters."

Miguel pouts, but creeps cautiously forward anyway. Being the Sea King's youngest, his only son, does not stop the top predators from considering him an equal opportunity meal. Tulio, an otherwise unremarkable octopus with the dubious honor of calling the Sea Prince his friend and partner, is no more protected. No sharks erupt from the shadows, so Tulio reluctantly eases his grip on the idiot.

The safest entry to the ship, the one lowest to the seafloor, are its tiny portholes. Tulio peaks his way inside, waving one tentative tentacle. Nothing tries to bite it off him so he oozes his way inside. Miguel's entrance is not so graceful. Even though he is not stacked like King Triton, his shoulders are just broad enough where he has to grunt and struggle his way inside. Tulio watches in great amusement.

"Oh, stop laughing! W-We can't all be... _boneless."_

"Flexible, you mean."

"Please, Tulio, how can I _not_ be flexible? Excitement, adventure, danger lurking around every corner. It keeps me on my fins!"

"...Sure."

Tulio can live without the danger. Really, he's just in this insanity for the treasure. That sweet, shiny, forbidden treasure.

...And maybe also keeping Miguel from getting devoured by giant squid. It's almost happened to the idiot more than once.

Under the sea most human things turn dull and ugly. Even the fresh items they find don't stay pristine for long. One of the exceptions is the shiny golden material humans creatively call _yellow._ If Scuttle can be believed. Tulio personally thinks the seagull eccentric at best but more likely outright insane. But he's their only source on human knowledge, and Miguel laps it all up. So Tulio takes him at his word. The stuff is most certainly yellow and _stays_ yellow. It's his favorite thing to find.

Most of the time. Until Miguel gasps in awe at a _true_ prize.

"Tulio! Tulio, look! We've done it!" Reverently he holds his find up, a silver stick with three tines at the end. "Have you ever seen anything so wonderful in your entire life?"

"Yes, very nice," Tulio agrees automatically, because Miguel lights up bright as the sun. "What is it?"

His partner carefully stores it in his satchel. "It's a... Well, um, we owe Scuttle a visit anyway."

The octopus rolls his eyes. Then a great white explodes its way inside, and the day somehow gets worse.

Miguel's pause at the porthole eats up precious time. Trapped behind, Tulio leverages enough tentacles to help shove his ass through. He follows behind, squirting a noxious black cloud in his wake. He hopes the toothy bastard chokes on it.

After swimming a fair bit away, they pause to jig at their victory. Their boasting cheers end as squeaks of horror as the shark barrels after them.

"Split!"

Miguel gapes at him, but obeys. The merman might make the bigger meal, but sharks are just intelligent enough to hold a _grudge._ The great white ignores the mer prince to chase after the octopus that near blinded him. It is quite right in thinking Tulio out of ink, and probably correct on him tasting delicious.

Not that Tulio ever gives him the chance. Ink might be a limited resource, but quick wit is fathomless. Where Tulio flees, the shark follows. Even through the ring of a rusted anchor.

Tulio makes it through. The shark does not.

"Hah! No eating here tonight, no eating here-"

When the shark's jaws snap inches away, Tulio does find enough ink to leave it one parting taste. He and Miguel retreat their lives and their treasure intact. That's a solid win.

Until Miguel realizes, hours late, he has accidentally skipped his own musical debut. All when Scuttle starts rambling over the _snarfblat._

* * *

The world is at peace. Boring, complacent peace. The goddess of discord spins her globe in search of one little thread to unravel.

Her eye is drawn to a wide stretch of ocean. Odd. Most in Triton's domain keep to their place. Her bratty little cousin's atrocious temper keeps them in check, and her from sticking so much as a finger in undersea affairs. And yet a rebellion, no matter how small and insignificant, is unfurling down there.

Intrigued, she zooms in to its source. A single merman, swimming down from a forbidden surface. Young, stupid, and utterly guileless.

And useless, were it not for a certain family connection.

Eris smirks.

"Yes, yes, hurry away, little prince. Can't make your daddy disappointed now." After a moment's consideration, she turns to her collection of creatures. Most especially her giggling sirens. "Oh, Ligeia, Leucosia."

Reluctantly the two flow away from their sisters, falling silent as they await orders. Sirens are a social bunch that prefer hunting packs. How unfortunate for them Eris actually requires _finesse_ once in a while.

"Don't pout, girls. I have a special mission just for you. Do keep a close eye on my good cousin's baby boy. He may be the key to making the whole ocean your playground."

Her main group of sirens whisper in excitement. With renewed eagerness Ligeia and Leucosia diligently fall to earth, their ethereal forms barely solidifying. In the material world they are watery, near invisible against the sea. They trail after the prince, he and the dark blue octopus both oblivious.

The pampered baby of the family must have weaknesses in spades. The fun comes from choosing the right one to crack open.


	2. being intrepidatious

Part of Miguel resents being chewed out like a naughty child. Most of him quivers in overwhelming guilt. All his sisters had rehearsed so passionately to help unveil him to Atlantica at large. Every fish folk had been excited to formally meet their prince. This concert was supposed to have been the crowning achievement of Sebastian's long, distinguished career. Like a proper prince, much less a merman old enough to accept responsibility, Miguel floats quietly while both king and crab tear him a new one.

"I'm so sorry, Father," he murmurs. "And to you too, Sebastian. I... I just... got a bit carried away."

"A bit?" Tulio hisses.

"Well, a lot, actually. There was this great white and then- Oomph!"

One of Tulio's tentacles slaps across his mouth before he can spill out anything compromising. Unfortunately they already have long established a pattern of chronic misbehavior.

"You went up to the surface again, _DIDN'T YOU?"_

"O-Of course not, your majesty," Tulio pipes up hastily. "Me and gravity, er, don't exactly agree, and-"

Miguel knows his father rages to cover his fear and intends no true harm by it. But Tulio only sees King Triton seemingly ready to fry him with his trident. He quails beneath his glare, sinking down as a tiny dark blue blob huddled on the palace floor. Sebastian, the lucky bastard, surreptitiously scuttles out of blasting range.

"It was all my idea, Father," Miguel blurts out. "Though... nothing happened..."

"Oh, Miguel," the king sighs, losing some of his temper. "How many times must we go through this? You could've been seen by one of those barbarians - by, by one of those _humans."_

His father hurls it like the foulest curse word. Miguel drifts lower himself, down near where his partner cowers. "I wasn't," he croaks out. "I swear, I wasn't."

"Do you think I want to see my only son snared by some fish-eater's hook?"

Miguel clenches his fists. He glares down at where his partner huddles for the inevitable explosion, away from his father's searching eyes, and waits for it all to be over.

"I am never, **_never_** to hear of you going to the surface again. Is that clear?"

"Crystal clear," Tulio squeaks out, while Miguel floats in spiteful silence.

Not trusting himself to not explode back, Miguel furiously surges from the great hall. Tulio bolts ahead of sheer fear for his life.

They only have one safe refuge these days. It is not among other friends, or the rooms where Miguel's big sisters reside, or the stables where Stormy the hippocampus silently weathers all his rants. There is only the hidden cavern, _their_ cavern, where all their ill-gotten gains are shelved up near the ceiling. Miguel swims tight, angry circles around their prized possessions, unsure if he wants to rage or to weep, as Tulio drifts anxiously beneath him.

But he's not gonna do either, but _especially_ never take things out on those around him. His father roars enough for their whole family, the whole damn ocean.

When he exhausts himself, Miguel drifts to the stony recline on the cavern's floor. He sulks there, head in his hands, until several blue tentacles quietly wind around one arm.

"I don't know how to make him understand, Tulio," he rasps out. "There's so much more beyond his ocean."

"Yes," his partner concedes. "But also fish-eating humans." He shudders. "Apparently I'm a delicacy up there."

Miguel sighs, rolling away from his resting place. Tulio flinches back. But the merman only reaches for the satchel. He glumly pulls out the dinglehopper, placing it in the center of similar items. They're all the same size and near identical, where it not for their different ends. One is rounded and another sharp.

"Humans are so much more," he murmurs certainly. "They have to be. How can a world that makes wonderful things be entirely evil?"

"Those could be torture devices," Tulio points out, uncertainly eyeing the alleged dinglehopper. "Two out of three do have pointy ends, and the other could be used for gouging out eyeballs or something."

Miguel crosses his arms and turns away to face a scavenged portrait. The human woman is portrayed only from the waist up. She might be mistaken for a mermaid, were it not for her strange abundance of clothes. Well, and the strange light she peers at, one that shines like a star. Is _fire_ bright as starlight, or glorious as sunlight? Do either, so far away, _burn_ like fire is supposed to? It's not like Miguel will ever know. The waves drown flames quicker than men.

"You can call merfolk half human," he answers after a long and thoughtful silence. "Or maybe humans are half merfolk. I... How can people that look so much like me, that make things I'll never understand, be _bad?"_

Tulio pokes a tentacle at a small bust, yet another human creation. With only a man's face visible, it might have been plausibly been a merman's, if its overly detailed craftsmanship didn't reveal it carved by human hands and tools. "Maybe everything good in you is in your tail," he ventures. "Merfolk are still fish folk. And humans are all trapped up there for good reason."

"I'm trapped _down here!"_ Too late Miguel bites his tongue, for the admission is already out there. "Not-Not that I'm unhappy, Tulio. Not while I'm with you. You make my life an adventure."

"And you make my life rich," his partner replies, disdainfully waving off his pile of precious _yellow_. "I don't need all this, when..." He trails off as a dark shadow drifts overhead, one all too familiar. "Is... Is that..."

Miguel rushes for the surface. From below the dark thing bobbing on the water almost likes the belly of a whale. Only when he breaches does the mystery clear.

For the first time up close Miguel beholds a true ship; not a wreck, but with one alight with life, with white sails proudly unfurled. It is made all the more magnificent by the full moon above, and the rainbow of stars that magically erupt from the ship in booming, colorful displays.

"Holy ship," Tulio gurgles, eyes just high above the water to see the spectacle while his beak and siphons lie below, where he can breathe. Merfolk are the only creatures of the see blessed with both lungs and gills.

"Tulio!" Miguel breathes in giddy excitement. "Tulio, look! This could be our destiny, our fate!"

"...What?"

"Hold on!"

_"What?"_

Tulio still does so, tentacles wrapping around his shoulders. He clings only tighter when Miguel surges after adventure.

It takes only a few giddy leaps to reach the hull. He shivers as he presses a hand to the wood. The wrecks are soft and rotting, like a creature dead in its shell. This hull is hard and firm, a healthy scallop in comparison. Better yet, his fingers find purchase against the slick side. If he squints the dark there are ridges that lead all the way up to the deck.

"Take a deep breath," he whispers, unsure what might drift up to the boat. "And don't let go until you need to."

"What's that supposed to- _Hmph."_

Miguel grabs the first rung. And nearly chokes himself when Tulio grasps his neck in a stranglehold. "Miguel, you know that little voice, the one people have... that tells them to quite when they're ahead? _You don't have any!"_

"Deep breath," Miguel wheezes out. And keeps climbing.

Tulio _eeps_ in terror. His grip loosens so far Miguel fears he'll bail out on their greatest adventure yet. But his partner only stoops low for a deep gasp, pumping water deep into his body, before climbing up for a more secure grip that thankfully does not choke his partner this time around.

For his part Miguel only muffles a cough as the last of the seawater drains from his gills. His latent lunges fill with their first breath since meeting Scuttle hours earlier, the night air cool and refreshing, and climbs with renewed haste. He'll have only minutes before Tulio needs to drop back down.

Their climb ends at a hole in the side just large enough to provide a full view of the deck. Men in striped, matching uniforms are celebrating, the sort of revelry not even King Triton could ever hope to replicate. No one under the sea plays instruments like those. Without the water to muffle them their sounds ring loud and clear. The men dance gracefully, even though gravity shackles them to the deck, and they cannot float beyond it. Miguel watches the swift shuffle of their feet, mesmerized.

The men are not alone. Gallivanting through the crowd is a creature like a hippocampus, only with _four_ legs instead of fins. Not a hippocampus then, but a... a _hippo._ Some men toss him bright red balls he snaps up eagerly.

Then the hippo pauses. His head snaps their way, nostrils flaring. Tulio taps a tentacle shoulder against Miguel's shoulder in a clear command to bail. The merman only turns away, back pressed nervously against the hull. Tulio's hold tightens in consternation.

Miguel waits a few heart-pounding moments before peaking back. The hippo is still there.

Miguel cocks his head. The hippo tilts his right back.

Eventually the merman works up the courage to hold out a careful hand. Tulio slaps it down. That surprise movement makes the hippo snort, tearing across the deck.

The octopus around his neck squeezes tightly, insistently, that their cover's blown. Miguel doesn't pull away. He watches the hippo canter to someone most definitely _not_ a man. His jaw drops.

Her bright red gown does not disguise her curves, but drifts low enough to the deck that Miguel can almost delude himself into seeing the most beautiful mermaid to ever swim the seven seas, a downright goddess. Then she shifts to face the hippo, revealing feet under the skirt after all. A fond smile curves across her face. Miguel's heart soars with it.

"Did another dolphin scare you, my big, brave Altivo?" The hippo snorts, stamping a hoof against the deck. "Oh, don't give me that look."

His surliness disappears the moment the woman pulls out another red ball from her sleeve. It's gone in one bite. Miguel bites back a laugh.

"Tulio," he breathes. "Tulio, do you believe it? We've never seen humans this close before, let alone one so... so..." Words fail, so he purrs and rolls his shoulders suggestively. Tulio head smacks him. "Ouch! What was that for?"

His earnest confusion only earns him another slap, and then a touch to the throat as a reminder that octopi have to breathe sometime. Miguel sighs and lowers himself, lingering as long as he can. An announcement over the music stops him cold.

"Silence! Silence! It is now my honor and privilege to present a gift from my liege, Prince Hans of the Southern Isles, with a very special, very expensive birthday present to Princess Chel." A human, especially small and simpering, bows grandiosely before the woman. "He commissioned it the moment he lay eyes on you, to immortalize the beauty and elegance he saw there. Prince Hans hopes it will clarify his fathomless feelings for you, and show your honored parents how the Southern Isles shall value our alliance."

Chel graces the man with a demure, diplomatic smile. Miguel recognizes it all too well. It too was drilled into him at a young age. "I am honored Prince Hans thinks so... grandly of me, when we met in person for the first time mere weeks ago."

"It is his sincerest wishes your children and grandchildren might one day be honored to gaze upon it, and know the face of the queen who made such a grand dynasty possible." The diplomatic beams. "Happy birthday, princess!"

With a grand flourish he unveils his prince's alleged declaration of love. The whole deck fells awkwardly silence, except for Altivo's snort of disgust. Miguel grimaces. Even Tulio makes a disdainful sound.

The face is vaguely like Chel's. It does not capture the light to her eyes, the curve to her lips. The statue's... er, assets, are overly generous. And somewhat lopsided. Compared to the humans on deck, including its alleged likeness, it is also scantily clad.

From a deep well of strength, Chel summons serenity. "It's... It's certainly breathtaking."

Miguel clamps down a laugh. One wheezes out of Tulio, so strained the merman immediately drops down to the water.

Despite sucking in water, Tulio never releases his grip on him. "Hey, hey, Miguel, what in Poseidon's name are you doing? Get your scaly ass back up there!"

"B-But you were-"

"You don't drag me up there and then pull me away when the drama was just getting good! Now I gotta know the end of this!"

This time Miguel does laugh. Back up he climbs, with an eager octopus as his fellow audience.

* * *

The diplomat's grandiose display has soured the celebration a bit. Miffed and muttering about how sailors can't appreciate fine art, he retreats to brood by the beer barrel. This allows Chel the space to retreat away. Only Altivo follows her. He flicks a knowing ear.

"Yeah," she sighs. "I know. That asshole would make a shitty consort and an even shittier king."

Not that Tzekel-Kan would ever allow the prince of a foreign power, even a thirteenth son, to assume control of Manoa's holy throne. Such a marriage grants their marriage dynastic ties and the perfect opportunity to finally throw Chel out of the succession entirely.

"There's someone out there for me, Altivo," she murmurs to only true confidant on this ship, with her family still so far. "One that can rule _with_ me and not _over_ me. They're out there. I know it."

The stallion nickers fondly. And dubiously.

"Believe me, when I find them I'll know, without a doubt. It'll just hit me like... like, lightning."

_BAM!_

The storm blows in fast and ruthless. It must be King Triton's doing. The Feathered Serpent does not have such a cruel sense of irony.

Sailors race to ready the life boats and batten down sails. Chel's small, swift hands come to her advantage. As the ship bucks and heaves with every roll of the sea, the burliest man onboard strains to hold the wheel steady. All others move to evacuate. The Southern diplomatic, a quivering wreck, scurries into the dinghy. Chel, despite her pounding heart, does so with grace. Someone needs to hold themselves together.

A scream, high and shrill, sounds above the shouts of the men. Chel's heart plummets with Altivo.

"P-Princess, what are you-"

She has the presence of mind to rip off her skirt, so she won't be snagged on any debris.

Then she leaps.

* * *

Miguel anxiously circles under the burning ship. Even the waters near it are uncomfortably hot, like he's strayed too near a thermal vent. First he anxiously drifts under the sailors that fall thrashing and screaming into the sea, but they all wind up scooped into lifeboats.

Then Altivo slams into the sea. On the wrong side of the ship. Those boats filled with men are bobbing the other way.

"Hold on!" Miguel cries up. "Help is coming!"

"Have you lost your mind?" Tulio yells after him. But the humans are on the other side, and a life at risk.

There's nothing Miguel can do, except murmur empty platitudes to the poor beast. The one boat near them is abandoned and upside down. Even if it wasn't, Altivo is much too big be hauled up.

Tulio tugs at his arm. His eyes are narrowed in frantic determination. "Loop the rope under the hippo!" Miguel does so, swimming under the wild hooves. Even Tulio snags some, mantle flared wide. "On the count of three, pull back on the rope!"

"What?"

"Three!"

Miguel tugs with all the strength in his body. Somehow momentum and a heaving wave hurls the boat upright, with a bewildered Altivo inside. They're both briefly stranded too before Miguel drags him and Tulio both back into their element. There. Now everyone is safe and-

_KRAKOOM!_

The ship splinters. Miguel squints against the blinding brightness. Clearly illuminated are all the lifeboats, propelled further away from danger.

And a single small shape, barely holding on.

When Miguel breaks the surface, he knows it's Chel, black hair plastered against her head and head lolling. She slips from her piece of wood before he reaches her. He dives, but Chel surfaces first, with blue tentacles wrapped around her torso.

"Take her already!" Tulio grits out.

Miguel does just that. He leans her form against his chest, bracing her far enough she won't accidentally inhale seawater. "T-Tulio, you-"

"Can you hold her until land?"

Miguel considers the precious weight in his arms, and the long swim to shore. He bites his lip toward an octopus too small and boneless to ever shoulder such a burden.

"Yes."

"Then let's quit wasting time."

Miguel glances around helplessly. From above there is only the sinking ship to serve as a guideline. Which direction should he even-

A tentacle tugs at his arm from under the water, urging him onward. The merman follows, slow and careful.

Behind them, over the sound of the wreck, Altivo bugles furiously. Squinting against the black cloud of smoke, Miguel spots another lifeboat rowing in the hippo's direction. No doubt they hope their princess aboard.

Miguel swims on. His tail and free arm help move them. It keeps him from guiltily touching Chel's wounds; the splinters in her hands, the dark cut trailing down her hairline, and the red rings of suckers on her skin darkening into bruises.

Below the water tentacles, soft and gentle, keep him alert and guide him back on course.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Little Mermaid cartoon gave the world 'giant seahorses' that... are really more hippocampi, what with us seeing little seahorses as normal talking denizens of the sea and all. So Miguel knows an honest to gods 'hippo' when he sees one XD Because he already has bribed all of Atlantica's hippocampi into adoring him. And grudgingly tolerating the snarky octopus that unfortunately seems to be a constant factor in his visits.
> 
> What to use when a Grimsby analogue didn't feel right here, and to illustrate the world's shitty attempts to court Chel? Disney saves the day yet again.


	3. like lightning

Dawn is breaking by the time they reach land. Good old forbidden land. Tulio, exhausted from a long night of unbroken swimming, lets the tide wash him up too. He regrets it the moment he breaches too shallow. His siphons flare against a breath more sand than sea. Gravity crushes down on his mantle like an invisible, ruthless hand. His tentacles trail after Miguel and his emerald tail before the merman hauls Chel past the waterline and then further up on the beach. Because Poseidon forbid high tide find her before the humans do.

From Miguel's weary, desolate expression, Tulio doesn't even know if the stupid princess is alive or dead. His gurgled question, shouted from beneath the water, goes unheard. With a weary sigh he hauls himself up high enough to shout, "How - How is she?"

Miguel's voice echoes differently in thin air as opposed to dependable seawater. "It's hard to say." He cautiously lowers an ear to her chest, but he suddenly jerks back. A smile bright as the morning lights up his face. "Oh, Tulio! Look, she's breathing!"

Tulio sags in relief. Then he waits for Miguel to drag himself back to the water.

Miguel does not.

"She's... She's beautiful."

Miguel lays a slow, reverent palm to Chel's cheek. Tulio's beak drops in horror when the idiot starts to _serenade her._

...Miguel somehow sounds even better above water than under it. Or just special in a different way.

Then Chel wakes up enough to _press her hand to Miguel's._ Tulio is distantly surprised his stupid beak doesn't fall off altogether. That's when he's finally pissed to start slowly and laboriously hauling himself onto land like some slow, ungainly sea slug.

The hippo's convenient arrival thankfully saves Tulio from suffocating over his idiot partner. But only barely.

Miguel still does not return to the water. Not fully. Clinging to a rock, he watches Altivo and some of the sailors help Chel to her feet and out of sight.

"I don't know when and I don't know how," he murmurs to thin air, to no one. "But somehow, some way, I'll find you again."

Tulio's blood runs cold.

* * *

Chel's first hazy thoughts are of deep blue eyes and strong, supple arms that lift her up from drowning high enough to breathe. Then she drifts somewhere new, on warm sand, surrounded by a melody that grabs her by the heart. When a hand, warm and gentle, caresses her cheek, she raises up her own hand to keep it there.

Blearily she opens her eyes to a man's face. His gaze is not blue like the deep, but green as a summer sea. His hair and beard are gold, and his smile bright as the sun. His song never falters, even when he turns in the direction of Altivo's sudden whinny. But his smile evaporates, as he green eyes go wide. Despite his fear his hand lingers on her skin.

As he pulls away Chel tries to reach for him. The horse suddenly slobbering over her ruins that train of thought.

"Princess! Oh, princess!"

By the time Chel sits up her savior is gone. Her gaze flicks from the ragged sailors running down the beach to the emerald tail of an abnormally large fish leaping for deeper waters.

"The man," she gasps out. "Did you see him?"

"Which man, princess?" questions the sailor who gently helps her stand.

It is Altivo who she leans against, slinging an arm around his neck. "The one who saved me. He was... singing. He had the most... beautiful voice."

The sailors stare uncertainly at each other.

"You might have swallowed a bit too much seawater, your majesty," one admits sheepishly. Those near him scowl and jab him in the ribs.

"Or maybe someone out there really took a shine to you," allows another.

Chel wrenches her arm off Altivo when her wounds finally tell her, yes, she is indeed in pain. She picks at the splinters under her nails and prods at the scab over her forehead.

More uncertainly, she brushes the circular bruises over her forearms. The pattern is almost familiar.

She tugs her sleeves down, and keeps those a secret for her maids.

* * *

Miguel is in love.

...Again. He is a very passionate merman, and has had no shortage of short and tumultuous affairs since hitting puberty. Atlantica is very familiar with the cycle by now. All his loves run much the same - random love ballads belted out at random intervals, dreamily staring out into space while plucking flowers, and then mournful reposes and angsty songs scrawled over sheets of music when the inevitable heartbreak arrived.

Miguel's six older sisters are well aware of his patterns. They've done their best to ward off more troublesome mermaids trying to land themselves a prince, or steer Miguel toward more stable potential partners. But their baby brother has wide tastes and a stubborn heart.

Their father is proud and exasperated in near equal measure over Miguel's legendary status among the mermaids his age. And blissfully oblivious that reputation extends to mermen.

Miguel's sisters are always the second source to learn of his latest object of affection. And realize near immediately this one is not like the others. Aquata, the oldest, notices the abundance of flowers everywhere, because Miguel is especially uncertain how this one will turn out. Andrina hears no poorly disguised allusions of beauty and Arista's usual sources of gossip go dry. Atina notes Miguel is suspiciously punctual, with no random excuses why he's late or early, just as Adella observes how especially _not_ debauched he appears.

Allana, most ominously, notes a certain blue octopus is more than mildly disgruntled. His moods are black, his smiles forced, and his excuses to leave plenty when Daddy is in the area. Miguel is blissfully or willfully oblivious to Tulio's envy.

Daddy catches on eventually. Subtle Miguel is not. And even King Triton knows enough about his boy to know something is different.

For once, Triton allows himself to feel hopeful.

Miguel is always infatuated. That this time his passion runs especially deep is... promising. In time, with careful encouragement, seeds for deeper affections might be planted and yield fruit. This lucky girl might finally be Miguel's proper love, one to ground him at long last.

Poseidon willing, this mystery mermaid will even drive off that troublesome octopus. Miguel is far too old for reckless adventures and a partner in crime.

Far off, Eris laughs in delight, and waits for the storm to break.

* * *

Once Tulio never thought he'd actually miss being chased by predators or dealing with insane seagulls, but here he is, missing the insanity he called a normal life with Miguel. Miguel, his best friend, his partner. The lovesick moron pining over a human woman unaware of his existence. Even the cavern isn't their safe retreat anymore, not when that stupid statue crash landed atop Tulio's pile of yellow. Miguel serenades it with all the songs meant for Chel. Usually all of Atlantica is treated to his love ballads. But now every song he composes his laden with longing for the sun and sand, for sailing ships and hippos, for a human woman that will never know their world.

So instead Tulio broods. He has it down to art form now. He lingers by the palace, because gods forbid he miss the day Miguel finally realizes his obsession is physically impossible to fulfill. Will get him killed if he tries. But also because Tulio can't tolerate the idiot's presence now.

"Tulio!"

Tulio hesitates, two visible tentacles falling limp instead of drifting with the current. The rest of him is contentedly squeezed into a small, dark crevice. He debates squishing all of himself inside.

Then he realizes that squeaky voice is not Miguel's, but the royal herald's. Tulio is many things. He is still subject to King Triton's laws as any. Reluctantly he emerges to face the tiny seahorse.

"Uh, hello. Sorry, is this crevice royal property? I was just-"

"Tulio," the herald repeats, putting two fins on his mantle. "Young octopus, I've been looking everywhere for you. I've got an urgent message from the Sea King."

"The Sea King," he repeats dumbly. _"Our_ Sea King?"

The herald wisely ignores his idiocy. "He wants to see you right away - something about the prince."

"He knows," Tulio moans in sick horror, once the herald bustles away.

Of course Triton knows. He's the fucking king of the sea. His trident controls the wide waters and the winds above. How can he not know his son is mooning over a human woman?

Tulio swims slowly for the palace throne room, both because he dreads the encounter and because the slower motion regulates water intake through his mantle. He'd be a hyperventilating mess otherwise. Whatever happens, he must remain calm. Even if Miguel spilled his own secret, the idiot faces only eternal grounding as his worst case scenario. Tulio is about to be transfigured into a barnacle.

He finds King Triton lounging upon his throne, surprisingly calm. Alarmingly calm, and clutching one of Miguel's many flowers. So this is what the calm before the storm looks out.

"Now who could the lucky mergirl be?" Oh. _Oh no._ Finally, Triton 'notices' his presence. "Come in, Tulio."

"Hey," he squeaks out, before clearing his throat and plastering on his brightest, most desperate smile. "Um, hello, your majesty. Today... Today sure is breathtaking today, isn't it?"

"Now, Tulio, I'm concerned about my son. Have you noticed he's been acting rather peculiar lately?"

"Peculiar? He's... He's _Miguel."_

The king arches a dangerous brow. "You know, moaning about, daydreaming, singing to himself... Those are quite particular symptoms, hm?"

"I... They're not... unusual for him."

"Young octopus."

Tulio _doe not_ ink himself in fear. "Hm?"

"We both know this time is rather unusual, don't we?"

_Do you know? Do you not know? For gods' sake, spit it out!_

"...Unusual?"

"About Miguel?"

"Miguel...?"

"In love?"

Suddenly, Tulio can take no more. He faces his king, one infamous for his rages, and erupts in turn. His feelings, repressed for _weeks,_ spew out hotly as that damned fire.

"In love? _IN LOVE!_ How can he be _in love?_ He saw her once, never even spoke to her unless you count that fucking _statue_! How in gods' great ocean can he love a human-"

Too late does he realize his fatal error. He sinks to the seafloor, trembling, and braces for the end.

But Triton's rage is not for him. Not truly. "Humans? _**What about humans?"**_

Tulio is spineless.

He bends where he does not break.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Octopi can survive brief periods out of water and even haul themselves around. Though under gravity they crawl like something out of Eldritch's nightmares. They can also pretty much squeeze themselves into any space large enough to accommodate their beak, the only solid thing in them.
> 
> Both of our boys are canonically prone to jealousy and pettiness. And eventually Tulio gets to be on the receiving end when Miguel starts chasing after Chel first :p Which means I can boil the 'sidekick' and the tattletale into one character.


	4. poor unfortunate souls

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which an idiot fails so bad at reverse psychology he blunders himself into the bargain too.

Surrounded by rubble of a shattered dream, of broken trust, Miguel does not rage. He is not his _father,_ who has only ever sought to destroy what he could not preserve.

He weeps, grief erupting out of him like it hasn't since the day since his mother met those... those _monsters,_ and secured her husband's hatred of a whole people forever and always.

"Miguel.... Miguel... I..."

The merman wrenches himself away from a tentacle too timid to close the gap between them. He can't even muster up the proper anger for one who deserves it best. "Just go away," he spits, before sinking back into despair. Tulio actually listening somehow makes it even worse.

"Poor child," murmurs a voice - no, _voices,_ that seem to sound from everywhere at once. "Poor sweet child."

Miguel peers up, wiping away his tears. At first he thinks himself alone. But a motion catches his eye. The two are near invisible, liquid silhouettes lit only by the whites of their eyes and the pale glow of their forms. They circle over him like sharks. Initially he mistakes them for phantom mermaids. Then he realizes each graced with human legs, though they are little more than water themselves.

"He has a very serious problem," they sing-song to each other, spinning closer and closer. "If only there was something we could do." Too close to his face, their lips pull back in sharp, sharp smiles. _"But there is something."_

"Who-Who are you?"

"Don't be scared," they assure in the least convincing voices ever. "We represent someone who can help you, someone who can make all your dreams come true. Just imagine, you and your princess, together... _forever."_

"Like... Like in death?" The watery women pause at that one, tilting their heads in bewilderment. Miguel rallies in their silence. "If so, no! Not now, and not ever!"

"Eris has great powers."

"The goddess of _discord?"_ His faint hope withers and dies, burning into anger. "I-I - No! Now. _G_ _et. Out!"_

The shades fall back, pouting. "Suit yourself. It was only a suggestion."

The currents shift with them as they turn to depart. It's strong enough to make Chel's stone face spin and land near Miguel's resting place. No, not her face, a pale recreation. The gray stone does not capture her earth-warm skin, her night-black hair. Cold stone is not warm and supple to the touch. Those empty eyes lack her spark, and those lifeless lips can never form a smile, or form his name.

She is all the chance he has, with all his other futures betrayed.

"Wait," he blurts out, clutching that remnant to his heart.

The shades turn around, gracing him once more with their creepy, creepy smirks. _"Yes?"_

* * *

Just outside the cavern, Tulio proves once more he is a terrible partner. He's too crappy to actually leave and too cowardly to actually cough up a proper apology. Instead he bangs his head against a rock, over and over again, in the hopes common sense or courage will come to him. Considering his mantle is soft, boneless tissue, this proves woefully ineffective. Even adding his tentacles to the equation doesn't help much.

A sudden cold in the current has him hiding behind that rock in panic. He cowers out at the ethereal forms of sirens, smirking and gleeful. Huh. Don't those usually congregate near rocks to dash ships asunder? His alarm only escalates when he spots Miguel, a mer _man,_ following fearlessly after them. Great, and now the idiot's _enchanted._

"Miguel? Hey, Miguel? _What are you doing?"_

The merman doesn't even turn his way. "I'm going to see Eris."

"No!" In desperation Tulio locks onto Miguel's tail with all eight of his limbs. "No! She's a demon, she's a monster! She'll chew you up and spit you out!"

"Why don't you tell my father? You're good at that."

Tulio goes limp enough for Miguel to disdainfully flick him off. Then he can only float there, gaping helplessly as his partner swims off to certain death.

He needs to get somebody. Preferably the trident-wielding king who strikes down such evils as part of the job.

Any delay might be too late.

Tulio is an octopus. What's he gonna do, ink the chaos goddess to death?

Swearing to himself all the while, Tulio pumps water through his mantle, and follows.

At least a stressful life alongside Miguel has prepared him well. After raiding so many shipwrecks the mass graveyard of them seems almost blase in comparison, especially because even sharks aren't stupid enough to hunt so near Eris' territory. The dive down that dark chasm is a bit daunting, but Miguel leads the way like usual. The sunken city at the bottom is practically Atlantica. An utterly desolate Atlantica inhabited only by the bones of behemoths, but still.

Okay, so the garden of moaning... polyp... things is creepy, but hey. Chaos goddess. She's not exactly the type to farm kelp. Tulio keeps his tentacles high from the groaning mouths snapping after him, and hurries his way inside.

Just in time for the even creepier, ephemeral woman... thing... to give him and Miguel a _lovely_ demonstration of all the merfolk who couldn't fulfill their forms of payment. Tulio gapes at the garden of lost souls in terrible revelation.

The gamble this is all for, pray tell? Tulio creeps anxiously close as Eris offers her bargain.

Miguel trades in his tail for legs and a grand total of three days' worth of humanity. If Chel gives him not just any kiss, but a _kiss of true love,_ then the condition is permanent. If not? He's a merman again. Briefly, with an eternity as a moaning polyp after that.

Tulio scoffs. Please. True love in a year's time? Tricky, but doable. A month? Outright insane. Three freaking days? Downright laughable. Even Miguel has to...

The idiot does not immediately recoil in disgust. Instead his expression grows alarmingly pensive. "If I become human, I'll never see my family again."

Eris coos, winding around him. "Oh, my prince, don't feel so alone. You're far from the first to throw all they grew up with for a chance at a new start. If you'll succeed you'll have your true love, won't you? A whole life to explore humanity and every wonder above the waves. You'll be so busy you'll never even miss them."

Tulio's horrified scream escapes as only a low, tortured moan. Miguel hates his guts now, and rightly so. Honesty here will defiantly drive him into his doom.

"Eris!" he calls instead. "I have come to bargain!"

The goddess of discord appraises him. Then turns to one of the starry abominations circling in the phantom sky around her. "Oh, Cetus."

_"Tulio, no!"_

They all freeze, even the eldritch monster. It growls when Eris unceremoniously shoos it back to the others, because apparently octopus isn't on the menu tonight after all. Her eyes, red and yellow, are all for one idiot merman.

"Throw me on as collateral to Miguel's little deal," Tulio continues on. "Two polyps for the price of one, and it saves you the trouble of writing up paperwork for a second. Quite the bargain, huh?"

Glowing eyes appraise them, slow and smug. "Quite the bargain indeed," she purrs.

"Tulio, you can't!" Miguel grabs him by the mantle, because there's no good place to latch onto an octopus. "I-I won't let you! This is _my_ deal! My life, my gamble!"

Tulio yawns, unimpressed. "Guess then I'll just have to make my own bargain, one revolved around you. We're partners, remember? Can't let go until you sealed the deal with Mel."

_"Chel!"_

"Oh, is it? We only ever heard it, what, once?"

Miguel glares, but forges on. "I-I-"

"What's the matter, fish boy?" Tulio jeers. "Can't do true love in three days?"

Miguel inhales raggedly, and lets him go. The octopus sighs. Best be despised for all eternity than wind up with Miguel as nightmare decor.

Miguel squares his shoulders, and juts up his chin. "Eris, you have yourself a deal."

"Not so fast, boys. We haven't even discussed the payment plan yet."

Tulio gapes. "B-But _I'm_ the payment!"

The goddess laughs, sweet and mocking. "Oh, little cephalopod, you're just a sweet little bonus! You even said so yourself!" The octopus stutters indignantly, but Eris plows on. "You can't get something _ex nihilo_ , little prince. Not anymore. And your little buddy's life, by his own admission, isn't quite up to snuff. Now, as I was trying to say, the discount to this lovely transaction is... your voice."

Miguel's hands fly to his throat. "My voice?"

"Hm-hm. And all that implies. No talking, no singing, and all the boring details."

"But without my voice, how can I-"

Eris runs an over-long finger down his bearded cheek. The merman flinches away. "You'll still have your looks, won't you? Shouldn't you ooze charm without your voice? Why, you might find your success rate even higher, if you can't keep talking your way out of relationships!"

Miguel's stuttered protests fall silent. Tulio almost comes to his defense, because he realizes the idiot _still_ isn't saying no.

They both squeak in horror when a lurid yellow contract weaves itself into existence, line by line. Great. Of course it's _legally binding._ What sort of chaos goddess actually respects cosmic institutions?

"Miguel," he whispers, as the merman stares in horror at that long, long agreement. "Miguel, you can't-"

With one final glare, Miguel seizes the handy fish-bone pen. He shuts his eyes as he signs his life away.

Tulio squeaks as the pen floats before him next. Under Miguel's scrawled name is room for one more signature. He tries reading the contract word for word, to hunt out any loopholes, but his eyes just can't quite focus. The longer he delays, the faster Miguel's breathing ramps up. He's careening into a full on panic attack.

"I... I... How do we know you'll actually keep _your_ side of the agreement?"

Eris chuckles condescendingly. "Oh, little cephalopod. A goddess' word is her bond. Once we make this little deal I'll be just as bound as you are. That is, _if_ you still are the stalwart partner after all."

Tulio seizes the pen. In one furious stroke he binds his fate to Miguel's, forever and always.

Three days in the polyp garden it is then.

Hopefully.

Their contract snaps solemnly shut, evaporating into smoke. Then Eris looms even larger above them, terrible and ineffable.

"Now, sing."

Miguel manages a simple melody, voice brittle with fear. The chamber goes thick in magic, so thick Tulio squints through the haze to peer at the golden orb roosted in his partner's throat like a miniature sun.

It's still singing when the long, pale tendrils of Eris' fingers snatch it away. Miguel's hands clutch at his throat. A scream of horror cuts off, as Eris swallows up the voice down a night-black throat. The chamber falls deathly silent, but for the distant giggles of the sirens.

Tulio slowly reaches out to wind one sympathetic tentacle around his shoulders, before he loses all limbs for the time being.

He stills when Eris' baleful eye next falls upon him. "And now you."

Tulio goes cross-eyed as he stares up at his mantle, and the light glowing up there. "I-I-"

He's still stuttering when Eris plucks his voice away. Only bubbles come out with his next shriek, because the goddess has already devoured it too.

"Oh, boys, save your screaming. That wasn't even the _fun_ part!"

The bubbles swirl and multiply, glowing that same lurid yellow. Then they start gloming together, swelling bigger and bigger.

Big enough to envelop Miguel. Tulio's tentacles snatch futilely after him, scalded by that ruthless magic.

He almost panics when a bubble grabs him too. No, he reminds himself. This isn't a surprise. Fucking unpleasant, but not a surprise. He's signed himself up for this.

That crackling white light swallows Miguel up to the torso. It takes all of Tulio, except his eyes.

Beyond his own agony, he watches Miguel writhe as his tail is shredded, rebuilt strand by strand. At least half of him will more or less be the same by the end of this.

What's happening Tulio feels worse. A _lot_ worse.

Some of his limbs going numb and melding together shouldn't be wrong, considering he's about to lose them altogether. The polyps are scrawny little bastards. Of course he's feeling stretched out, heavy as he's dragged down to a likely eternity on the seafloor.

But not everything feels right for a horrific polyp transformation. He grits his beak as it retracts, but does not dissolve. Instead he feels it _multiply,_ forcing sharpness all through soft, yielding tissue. His organs, all on a migration downward, furiously protest this new arrangement. Agony shrieks down his remaining limbs, as their flexibility dies by degrees. Waiting to lose movement altogether is the most terrible part.

Before that happens, Tulio discovers a new fear when the last of his siphons dissolve. For some terrifying moments he can't breathe at all.

His next attempt is impulsively drawn through what his beak has become. Water flows in, with no way out.

Then the bubble pops.

He drifts to the seafloor, strange and stiff and suffocating. His eye blearily finds Miguel's.

Miguel, green eyes wide and horrified. Even as he sinks himself, he does not strain toward the surface, but toward... Tulio.

A stream of bubbles escapes in reprimand. _Swim up, you idiot! You can't breathe down here anymore!_

Eris' voice booms from all around them.

"Well, well, well. What a looker _you_ turned out to be."

_...What?_

Suddenly the water in the cavern shifts, surging toward that glowing globe. He couldn't fight the current if normally shaped, so he doesn't.

Tulio tries to keep his eyes trained on Miguel. In the chaos he glimpses himself as he tumbles mantle over sucker, pale and _wrong._

It's a mercy when his vision finally goes black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...Well, I said 'an octopus until shenanigans' didn't I? ; ) Gotta milk the drama.
> 
> Tulio was originally gonna begin this self-indulgent romp as a merman, or similar creature. But no, my brain decided. Miguel isn't just charging off after adventure this time. He is willing to throw his whole life away over a dream, because he thinks he has nothing left to lose. Tulio being 'that' sort of partner early on lessens the glorious chaos Eris thinks she can make from them because by gods the LOOPHOLE ABUSE they'd get up to. And the only way to kill their relationship beyond very, very close platonic friendship was to make the species barrier too big to cross until Eris got ideas.
> 
> And yes, Eris basically set up shop in R'lyeh. Because it fits her aesthetic.


	5. washed up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Chel's fantasies almost, almost come true.

Distantly Miguel is aware of orange clouds overhead, as he struggles against strange limbs and shallow water to shore's safety. Once he gets his arms around a rock, he crashes. Maybe it's dusk or maybe it's dawn. He groans awake to a new blue sky. Only there is no groan. There might never be again, if he doesn't win that gods damned bargain.

Miguel gives up on trying to squint through his hair. He brushes it off his face, pauses as he notices its color. It... It never used to be this intensely yellow, did it? Or prone to frizzing. In water it billows gracefully around him. Now, as it dries for the first time, it seems hellbent on puffing up into a cloud.

Only then does Miguel remember he has radical new changes to explore beyond frizzy hair. He peers down into the water, and the new limbs hiding there.

Cautiously he bends his new knees. He moves them as one, like they _are_ still one. They bend much the same way as his tail. Bringing them above the water line, he marvels at their color, the same boring peach as the rest of him instead of brilliant green fish scale. With a bit more thought he brings up just _one_ leg, adorned by five tiny... tapas? Was that the word?

No. _Toes._ He can wriggle all five of them. Trying to move each one individually, like they're tiny fingers, proves impossible.

Miguel grimaces as he considers something else that has no reason to be flopping out at the moment. Not like he has the option to practice decency anymore.

So _that's_ why humans wear so many clothes!

The brand new man frowns as more of the recent past drifts back to him. The tiny pains of gaining individual toes might have paled in the greater scheme, but he recalls damn well forming the legs themselves. Because his tail had been _sliced in half._ Just as he remembers squinting through the haze of pain, to the bubble beyond his own. His fear for Tulio had weighed above all else, including the transformation's fire.

By the time he had realized what his partner was being shaped into, the strangely familiar form emerging from that bulbous head and eight limbs, it had been almost all over. And now-

_Tulio?_

Miguel leans against his rock, surveying his surroundings. His eyes are swiftly riveted to the form, pale and lean, draped lifelessly over the rock next to him. Miguel hauls himself forward by his arms alone, legs dragging uselessly behind.

_TULIO!_

His partner doesn't stir, even when Miguel hauls him upright for the first time. His head lolls limply against his chest.

Miguel's eyes dart around. Frantically he recalls his first trip to the surface in years, his body's inability to remember its lungs. And how Tulio had accidentally got them working again.

He braces his partner, then thumps him solidly on the back.

The force starts a chain reaction. Tulio's chest convulses, before he leans over and starts hacking up seawater. Miguel holds him steady, rubbing a soothing hand down his back. The feeling of _bones_ under his partner's skin is the strangest yet, stranger than even the long black hair getting in the way, or that his partner has lungs at all now.

After only bile remains, and even that leaves, Tulio starts choking again. His eyes bulge as he tries to move, to push water through his siphons, to breathe as he did up until mere hours ago.

Miguel holds him firm. He breathes as loud as he can, from his mouth and from his nose, lays Tulio's hand over his chest.

Several terrifying seconds later, Tulio's blind panic crumbles into confusion. Even as he gasps out his first true breath, and soon learns to regulate them, his bewilderment only deepens. His blue eyes, mercifully unchanged, flick rapidly around. They finally fixate on the pale hand still groped against Miguel's chest.

Fingers clench, as Tulio brings up both hands for the first time. Then all ten of them twitch manically, as if to make up for him being down half his limbs. He lurches away from Miguel, flailing against even stranger legs, as he feverishly inspects every part of himself. And there are quite a few new parts to take stock of.

Miguel simply watches him, his grin expressing all the joy and relief his words currently cannot. Tulio is alive and well, despite Miguel's stupid pride endangering his life.

And, just as importantly, his partner is still himself, even stuck in skin and bones and a strange new face.

Tulio eventually notices his staring. He stares right back. Then blue eyes trail downward, to grimace at Miguel's new legs, and again at his own unexpected pair.

Miguel cautiously scoots closer to close the gap between them. He wraps an arm around a thin shoulder and squeezes in the best apology he can currently handle.

Slowly, Tulio raises a hand. Miguel shivers as it settles on his shoulder. Humanity has made Tulio warm and fleshy, like... like... Well, with their human legs still largely obscured by the water Miguel might almost mistake him for a merman. An exceptionally striking merman, all the more precious because those deep, intelligent eyes belong to his partner.

Miguel beams like the sun as that second hand finds his other shoulder.

He's still grinning even as those hands slowly inch their way up to his throat.

And those deep blue eyes blaze with murder.

* * *

Manoa is her home. Manoa is her birthright, a sacred city that expanded into a kingdom in the centuries since the Old World found the New. Her line, the line of King Tannabok, has ruled for untold generations, in some form or another.

Manoa is... stressful. Like her family. Just because Chel loves her parents very much doesn't mean she appreciates having to be beholden to them like they are to the kingdom. Just because she adores all six of her little brothers doesn't mean she can take their shouting and their endless questions all day, every day. Even a palace starts to seem small when brothers insist on tripping underfoot, and scream down every hall.

Maybe that's why Chel clings so hard to her mystery man, who had saved her life, had sung something that sounded for her and her alone. He might very well be a dream baked up by too much sand and seawater. At times she can't remember his face. Were his eyes green, or blue? She pictures a golden beard but also a flash of another color, one that only could have have been deep blue-black.

Had... had he even been _alone_? She can almost remember scraps of conversation, a voice so close to her, and then almost too soft to hear.

Yet she was found alone on that beach, without even footprints leading away.

So Chel searches. She rides Altivo through the city streets, to hopefully hear a performer with a voice like no other. She searches the docks for young sailors with golden hair and fishermen with eyes like the sea. At her most desperate she delves deep into the palace library and temple archives, for small spirits and forgotten gods. These are questions she can't take to any priest, not when Tzekel-Kan has eyes and ears in every shrine.

Maybe he's out on another long fishing expedition. Maybe he is a foreigner, long set sail for home, or a native diver, already stolen for good by the sea.

Or maybe he never existed at all, except as an escape. He's the excuse to avoid the worried eyes of her parents, the brothers who cling like they'll lose her to the sea if they ever let go, the high priest who can barely conceal his fury that she survived the storm.

Tossing and turning from _that_ dream once again, Chel gives up on sleep. In the stables Altivo greets her with an eager whinny. Within minutes they're off, galloping away from the summer palace down pristine white sands. Low tide has left a flat, even course. Her stallion flies. For a time Chel can close her eyes and pretend herself just as free.

Only years of horsemanship saves Chel from falling when Altivo suddenly jinks to the side, rearing furiously. Her legs cling to his side as she reins his head down. "Altivo!" she calls, murmuring into his ear when he calms down enough to sink back down. "Easy, Altivo. Easy, boy. It's only... Oh."

_Oh._

Chel gawks down at the two figures in the rocks. One has tried squeezing himself deeper into the rocks, and failed miserably. Mostly because he does not seem to realize his limbs cannot bend that way. The other gapes dumbly back up at her.

Both are out of breath, their hair mussed with salt and sand, and without a stitch of clothing between them.

_OH._

"Right," she says, whipping her head around far too late. "Um, sorry about that. So, so sorry. I'll-"

Altivo nickers softly. Chel looks back in time to see her horse gently bump his nose against the golden man's shoulder. Finally, his shock breaks, and he graces them both with a smile bright as the morning.

Numbly Chel slides from her saddle. Maybe this is one of _those_ dreams after all, and tonight her brain has just decided both was good by throwing her two separate ideals of her rescuer. Or maybe...

"You seem very familiar to me. Have we... met before?" His emphatic nod brings a grin just as wide to her own face. "It - It _is_ you! Please, what can I call you?"

The green-eyed man answers. Or tries to. His lips move. His tongue forms a word. Only silence escapes. Affronted by the muteness, he tries again, and again. He can't even manage a grunt. He defaults to wild gesturing she can't understand any better.

"I'm sorry," she murmurs.

Too late she notices the marks beyond the nudity and the leanness of their muscles. Their soft skin has been split open by the sharp rocks, bruised in some spaces. Before the bearded man can hit himself in his frustration to be understood, she grabs his hand. He stares at their point of contact and stops trying to bruise himself further by knocking every limb against the rocks.

Chel turns hopefully to his partner, remembering that dream, those snatches of a one-sided conversation. Maybe she's placed the voice to the wrong face?

The glower back is answer enough.

"Sorry," she repeats.

Two mute, naked men alone on the beach. Without a single footprint to show their arrival, no matter the signs of their earlier activities. Okay then.

"W-Where did you even come from?"

The blond man once more gesticulates in all directions, this time without ever letting go of her hand. More helpfully, his partner just jerks a hand out toward the ocean.

Chel swallows thickly. Suddenly the jerky movements and frustrated silence make terrible sense. Survivors from a shipwreck. Who knows how long they drifted on the open ocean, baked by the sun and without a drop of fresh water, before the gods granted them the mercy of these shores?

"Don't worry," she assures, rising to her feet. "I'll help you up. And for however long you need it afterwards. It's the least I can do, for nearly running over you with my horse."

Since she's already holding the golden man's hand, she helps him up first. He's drifted long at sea. His legs buckle like they've forgotten how to hold his weight. Despite being slouched her, staggering with every move, he grins like her baby brothers did each time they took their first wobbly steps.

Altivo snorts vehemently as they near.

"Like I can carry him myself! Besides, Altivo, you were actually the one who near ran them over."

The stallion droops somewhat in defeat, before rolling his eyes at the other obvious reason he might not want the man on his back.

Chel blinks down at the horse's pointed stare. So does the man himself, until he finally jerks his free hand to cover his shame. His very belated attempt only near topples him and Chel back into the sand. Rolling her eyes back, she rips off the light coat she wore against the morning breeze, and solves that particular issue.

Actually getting the man onto Altivo is another challenge entirely. But once astride he manages an elegant sidesaddle. Huh.

If the first man was a drunk foal, then the second man is a boneless heap. He flips and flops before all of them drag him onto a fuming Altivo. Finally up there, he clings to his partner for dear life. With arms _and_ legs. She doubts the old sailcloth wrapped around the dark-haired man is _that_ effective a shield between them.

His partner doesn't bat an eyelash.

Chel grabs Altivo's reins, patiently leading from on foot. "We're going to start walking now."

For the sake of not getting her best 'I'm not mad just disappointed' look, Altivo plods along as slowly as possible. They both hear the black-haired man's squeal of terror loud and clear, for all they can't _actually_ hear it.

* * *

Today is officially the worst day of Tulio's life.

Stupid bones. Stupid gravity. Stupid hair, always getting in his eyes. Stupid ocean, rejecting two of its own subjects. Stupid hippo for interrupting his near-successful attempt to strangle the life out of his idiot partner. If only he could have made his stupid new fingers work that effectively!

Stupid Chel, with her stupid sympathetic looks and stupid basic common sympathy.

And her stupid, stupid curves. Tulio is torn between the sway of her hips and his very intimate view of Miguel's lissome build. Stupid human eyes. How is he even supposed to soak in the sights if humans are so distracted by each other?

Once they stagger off Altivo, Tulio discovers one bright spot. Even hunched over with his new spine, he's _taller_ than Miguel. The part of him that always preferred to float above his partner's eye level is inordinately pleased by this.

But Miguel only grins up at him and derives Tulio the pleasure of rubbing in his sudden shortness.

Chel's palace is a grand, golden thing that rivals Atlantica, only not really. All the servants here are common humans, while the Sea King's court is served by his myriad subjects. And the plants are all disappointingly still instead of drifting with the current. Instead of being able to drift up through the halls, they have to climb up one monumental step at the time. They're both out of breath by the end.

Their reward for all those stubbed toes and bruised shins on the climb up? A tub of bubbly water. After being hauled _from the gods damned ocean._

They stare at the tub, and then at each other.

Miguel manages an open smile. Of course he does. The idiot is so desperate to be human that even their stupidest traditions are-

Tulio splutters as he is gently and relentlessly shoved into the same damn tub. He writhes a bit, before slumping against the side. Miguel smiles blissfully at him, and he can't help but feel his own lips curve up too.

The water is _warm._ Not scalding, like near the thermal vents, but a body-wide embrace. Tulio basks like algae in sunlight. When a toothy comb is dragged through the sandy snarls in his unruly new hair, he only grimaces in displeasure, instead of chucking it across the room. Because the rest of him feels _that_ relaxed. It's almost like he's properly boneless again.

"We can cut it, if you'd like."

Tulio freezes in horror. Then shakes his head so hard he does send the comb flying across the room.

He's not resuming his true shape three days from now to discover his tentacles all hacked off. Yeah, no. Three days of blowing hair out of his eyes sounds like a small price ot pay.

Assuming he's not just gonna be a polyp all eternity after this.

Tulio's train of thought is interrupted by the princely sniffs to end all sniffs. Miguel snatches the brush before the servant can.

And turns it on his partner.

Tulio leans right into it because, _gods,_ now he understands why Miguel and his sisters waste hours brushing each other's.

After the brush come gentle, expert hands. They tie together every last strand. Tulio turns thoughtfully, the pony tail moving with him. Not only is his vision now clear, but the sensation of that wet hair is almost, _almost_ like a numbed limb trailing against his back. He can almost delude himself into thinking one of his lost limbs restored, except the two feelings are not at all similar.

When Tulio turns again, Miguel has grabbed for a mirror. Then he sheepishly lowers it, as if perhaps realizing rubbing all this in is not the most tactful thing after all.

Rolling his eyes, Tulio snatches it from him, before promptly dropping it in the water. Stupid flimsy fingers.

Fishing it from the tub, he beholds this human guise, long black hair and angular features. His chin is oddly shadowed. He rubs at it, surprised by the rough stubble already sprouting there. Humans have to be twice as hairy as merfolk. Just peachy.

...Not that the stubble is going, either. Watch him become an octopus with his beak trimmed off.

He stops frowning at the stubble to take in the whole face. Only the blue eyes are familiar. It's not the reflection he knows most, but it's still _him._ Just... unnervingly human Tulio, instead of good old octopus Tulio. And it's a pretty damned good face by multiple standards.

Tulio feels his lips curve up again. The mirror informs him it's a smirk, teeth and lips showing what only his eyes once could.

Then his eyes flick up to their next hell - proper human clothing, heaviness and all.

That's how he learns his grimace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sunstroke, extended dehydration, and very heavy stress from drifting at sea can leave nasty effects behind. As a princess of a hot coastal kingdom Chel should have some idea why these poor naked idiots washed up with balance and speaking difficulties. Even if it's not the RIGHT idea for this particular scenario.
> 
> Miguel is dealing with only one brand new half, and was an experienced hippocamp rider long before he met an actual 'hippo.' Poor Tulio is still getting used to a skeleton.


	6. tempting the palate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the author does indeed find a movie line to title this chapter with.

Long before Chel tripped over little brothers, she was the sole hope for the throne, Tannabok and Miya's little miracle.

A lonely only child, with more books and lessons than playmates. She learned to escape her tutors early, once Tannabok thought to trust her alone for extended periods. With her big heart and boundless generosity, Chel soon stole herself some friends. Long before the servants wrangled princes, they buffed up their experience with puppies, orphaned fledglings, and those 'kittens' that turned out to be abandoned ocelots.

Her tastes have somewhat... evolved, since then.

Not that Tannabok personally sees the near-naked men she brings home before they're dragged up for a proper bath, but gossip spreads like wildfire. And quickly sets Tzekel-Kan alight.

"The impudence of it all, to drag the unwashed riff-raff into your holy home! Your daughter forgets who rules here!"

_And so do you._

But only in the realm of the secular. The spiritual affairs are not governed by an earthly king, but the high priest and speaker of the gods.

"Our line is beholden to all our people," Tannabok answers patiently. "I have long opened my kitchens and my coffers to them. Extending hospitality to two survivors of a terrible shipwreck is no different."

"A likely story!" Tzekel-Kan sneers. "Two men, washed up without crewmen or great debris, to stumble upon your daughter at such a fortuitous time! And both conveniently mute, if the servants are to be believed!" The high priest leans in, eyes gleaming. "If I may be so bold, your majesty?"

Tannabok is not a tall man, but he is a broad man. His royal mother taught him the self-restraint to not push high priests out windows, just like she also taught him how to loom large enough to take up a whole room. Insinuations Chel is plotting intrigue beneath his very nose makes him loom like only an infuriated parent can loom. Tzekel-Kan scurries back.

"Chel remains my heir, and your future queen, until at least the arrangements of a marriage can be finalized. Her guests are _my_ guests, under my roof, and my hospitality."

The high priest stares long and hard, before he finally submits in his most mocking bow.

"As the king commands," he hisses, and takes his leave.

Tannabok counts to ten. Then he faces one particular column. Chel casually strolls out.

"Oh, hello, Dad! What brings you here?"

Tannabok sighs. He is strong enough to sweep all his family up into one crushing hug, all six boys included. In her own way, Chel is twice as strong, and thrice as clever. A royal of Manoa can be nothing less, when there are foreign powers to play against each other, and an increasingly demanding priesthood to placate.

Chel is also endlessly braver than he is, and bolder. On his own Tannabok might not have never found out. But Miya has long perfected the spy network constructed by her mother-in-law, and keeps especially keen eyes on Chel.

And it is no coincidence Chel has stumbled across two men fitting her descriptions.

"Chel," he sighs. "What's your angle here?"

His daughter has honed some very fine poker faces. The utter bewilderment, and then indignant rage, are not two of them.

"No angle!" she spits. "They were lost, and hurt, and _alone!_ I did what I had to do!"

That's all there is to it. He sweeps her into a hug that lifts her straight off the ground.

"I know," he murmurs. "You always have."

"I... I should the next round ready for you and Mom soon. Within the week. I just low... er, reconsidered my priorities again. There are a couple of... highly available one in here. The right one has to be in here."

Tannabok considers the long string of the princes and dukes, counts and lords, that have come before. They had all been liars and lechers, those eager to rule through a rightful queen or drag her off like a prize trophy. Tzekel-Kan would have accepted any of them, so long as they had brought Manoa ships, gold, a name on their side to be feared and revered.

If only Chel had signed away any claim to her rightful throne.

Tzekel-Kan will accept nothing less. The humblest prince will be the most pathetic, the generous the loosest. There is only weakness in virtue.

It would take nothing less than outright divinity to finally shut him up.

Tannabok hugs his little girl tighter, as if his arms might forever hold her safe from the world and all its cruelties.

* * *

Dinner, as small and personal as can get, begins with its normal happy chaos. Baby Chiku stares in utter wonder from his sling while toddler Kuili angrily plucks and hurls grapes around. Yei and Ome debate on who _really_ won today's ballgame, each talking over little Naui, who quietly points out they _tied._ Matla, as the oldest boy, tries firmly shushing them and gets dragged into the argument himself.

Chel clears her throat and sits up primly as she can. Her four oldest little brothers scramble to copy her. Kuili flings his next grape at her head. Mom snatches it from the air.

"Boys," she warns, in that gentle tone that brooks no defiance. "We have company tonight."

Matla wilts a little. _"Another_ prince?"

Yei and Ome grin like sharks. _"That_ kind of prince?"

...This is what Chel gets for using her little brothers to chase off the shittier marriage prospects. "Two dinner guests," she corrects. "Not princes at all."

The little monsters deflate in disappointment.

"Survivors from a shipwreck," Dad adds, which only sharpens sullenness into hungry interest. His voice cuts off the sudden stream of questions. "They've both been through a lot today, boys. We're trusting you to be on your best behavior and not make them feel uncomfortable. Can you do that?"

Chel smiles at the enthusiastic promises from her oldest brothers, that try so hard to make them proud, and prove themselves big boys and not babies. She could have just sent food up to her guests' rooms, but they're supposed to be _guests._ Dining alone with them might send the wrong message. What's more inviting than eating like they're part of the family?

...Well, maybe not have grapes being chucked at them. Or sitting next to boys near ready to implode from holding back their questions. This might either be the best medicine her guests can get, or the trauma that will never let them speak again.

"Your majesties," interrupts a herald. "Presenting your... esteemed company."

Chel splutters on her sip of wine, because that beats spewing it across the room. Her opinion that they could never look better than they did on the beach keels over as she sees the boys cleaned up. The blond one, beaming in bright red, all but vibrates with excitement. His partner lingers on the shadowy threshold, before a bright grin and insistent hand tug him onward. In blue and black he cuts a striking figure against the setting sun, even if he looks ready to curl up and die.

"Y-You're both looking wonderful," she manages, before tripping over her poor choice of words. "And steadier on your feet. I hope you're feeling better to."

The sunny one nods vibrantly. Even his partner allows a curt nod.

Introductions start smoothly enough. They both bow before her parents. Their balance is not quite there yet, for they wobble precariously as they do so. The sunny one grins at her brothers, just as curious of them as they are back. His partner regards them like he's treating with a school of piranhas. His fear is not entirely unfounded.

Chel freezes in pleasant surprise when the blond man swoops to kiss her hand. Her skin tingles at his whiskery beard.

Not to be outdone, the blue-eyed man also seizes her hand. He kisses with a bit too much tongue and awkwardly lets go a heartbeat too late.

"Charmed," she squeaks out.

"Um," Matla breaks in, saving them all from the situation. "What should we call you guys?"

Sitting down is good. Sitting down is great. Sitting down allows her to down her wine and slap her mind away from dirty, dirty fantasies.

The sunny man pantomimes with heroic zeal. Her brothers spend the wait for dinner shouting out names from Eugene to Ricardo. The black-haired one only scribbles a finger across the table.

Oh. Right.

Once he's actually handed writing materials, the man pauses. He fumbles with the quill. Slowly and painstakingly, he jots down five shaky letters.

Everyone at the table old enough to read cocks their head. And squints.

"...What?" Matla blurts out.

Ome's eyes widen in dread. "Are those even _more_ letters I have to learn?"

Biting his lip, the blond snatches the quill from his partner. He writes smooth and swift. The table considers his name. It's longer than his partner's, the letters fluid. There are letters in common, that at least proves them to be working off a common language and not sunstroke.

"I'm sorry," Chel murmurs at last. "I can't read that."

"Neither can I," admits her mom, who looks over every diplomatic letter that reaches their city. "I'm so sorry, boys, but I'm not sure if any scholar here does. Parts of the script look... almost familiar, but nothing I can place definitively to what I know."

The sunny man deflates, moping so badly even his sour-faced partner nudges him. He jolts at the shoulder contact, coming back to himself.

"You two must be famished," Mom blurts out, pushing a bowl of fruit their direction. "Dinner should be out soon, but this should help tide you over."

The men glance to themselves, to the bowl, and then back to each other. The darker one stares down at his hands and doesn't move. His partner deftly snatches an apple.

When he's choking on the stem thirty seconds later, Dad's hand slaps him against the back. "Small bites, son," he chides as if scolding Yei. "Just because you starved out on the ocean doesn't mean this food is going anywhere."

Most eyes at the table watch the man as he goes for another bite. They glance to each other as he happily downs the apple core too. No one has the heart to interrupt him.

Except Naui.

"D-oo-l-ee-o.. Dulio?" Chel gapes at her little brother, who stares up at the dark-haired man, and every painstaking move of his mouth. "Oh. _T,_ not _D._ T-Tulio?"

Tulio puffs out his chest and grins, proudly rubbing Naui's head.

After minutes failed on the other's miming, it takes Naui thirty seconds to sound out _Miguel_ from Tulio's careful enunciation.

The family basks in the solving of that mystery of all of a minute. Then Miguel starts coming his hair with his fork and starts a brand new trend among Chel's impressionable little brother.

Before Tulio can pinch off his nose from sheer exasperation, dinner arrives.

"Our main meal is stuffed crab tonight," Chel offers. Even before the lid is lifted, Miguel's horrified expression has her blurting out, "We have options without meat too!"

Miguel happily helps himself to the fruits and salad, barely even hesitates on the fiery chili before downing his bowl. Tulio has no such reservations against seafood. He shrugs and tucks into his crab. Eventually. For a good minute he just watches Naui and Matla cut into their own food. His hands tremble with the silverware. Among a table of young and eager boys, he proves himself no clumsier an eater.

Chel bites her lips as she considers diplomats from the Far East, and her own disastrous attempts at chopsticks.

"You two aren't from around you, are you?"

Tulio rolls his eyes at her stating the obvious. Miguel's sheepish smile falters as he huddles into himself. Her stomach twists guiltily.

"Perhaps you might enjoy seeing some sights of the kingdom, then? If you're interested. I can hardly call myself a hostess if I can't show you all Manoa has to offer."

Dad smiles playfully as she takes in the view from their dining hall, the city shining gold. "It's beautiful, isn't it? There's a reason foreigners call it El Dorado."

Mom grins right back. "It's especially beautiful up close. We have people and goods from all across the Atlantic, on top of traditions we've practiced for hundreds of years. No other harbor in the world has kingfish or turtle ferries."

Miguel beams at them, then at Chel herself.

Her heart somersaults.

Tulio rolls his eyes. His look of defeat once Miguel sweeps an arm over his shoulder is answer enough.

Tulio sullenly reaches for a bite off another plate.

"That's Kalahari," Yei informs him.

"Calamari," Matla corrects.

"Nuh-huh!" Naui shakes his head. "That's _octopus!"_

Tulio drops his fork.

* * *

Dinner is... chaos. It's careful effort to keep himself from looking clumsier than the kids, from smiling awkwardly through their endless stream of questions and the food the toddler chucks his way. It's the cadence of little kids fighting over the last slice of melon, of King Tannabok and Queen Miya defusing a hundred little arguments, of Chel up-selling a city where people can apparently make the sun rise and fly like birds through the air. Pft. Yeah right.

Dinner is bits of crab all over his human clothes, because at least some food's familiar up here, and Tulio can imagine it's Triton's prissy composer.

Dinner is near making himself a cannibal, because humans are indeed shameless fish-eaters. At least that kid stopped him in time.

Time flies. One moment they're struggling to get the table to know their names, the next people are carrying sleeping kids off to bed and they're being ushered to their own chambers. They get rooms right next to each other, and yet another change of clothes, this one just for sleeping in. How many sets do humans need?

Then Tulio is left standing alone in a cavernous bedroom, yet another strange bunch of clothing in his arms, and only a flickering little candle to light the darkness.

His heart pounds, as he realizes it's _night._ Hadn't they just been washed up on the shore, the morning light still fresh? Where has the day gone?

The first day. A third of their lives on land used up. In two nights, Eris is coming for their souls. And today Miguel's grand milestone was Chel _learning his name._

...They're doomed.

Constricted, Tulio tears himself out of his clothes. And shivers miserably against the chill until he wrestles his night clothes on. At least these are looser, and flow more loosely around him.

The bed is soft, and unnervingly large. He lies awkwardly atop before discovering he can burrow under its covers. He does so until the heaviness near asphyxiates him.

Then he tries squeezing himself _under_ the bed. He should be soothed by the security, the tightness, how no human would ever think to look for him down here.

The stone floor is cold and hard. He repeatedly bangs his new stupid skull against the bed frame.

With no other option available, Tulio storms from his room and rips open Miguel's door.

He discovers the idiot dreamily leaning over his balcony. Is he already pining for the ocean he already gave up?

Tulio's glare falters he glances over the rail to the sight of Chel currying down Altivo. There is only softness in her eyes, a gentleness to her strokes that does odd things to his one stupid human heart. A wry smile lights up her face as she notices them gawking. When she waves, Tulio feels himself grin and wave right back. Because apparently all humans are idiots.

When Chel finally leads Altivo away, Miguel turns and wanders back inside, brushing his hair with a _fork._ They know it's a fork, that it's an eating utensil. Small children know it's a fork. Tulio's spluttered protest goes unheard, because of course he can't talk at all right now.

His purposeful glare also falls short. Miguel just reaches up and undoes the tie in his hair. Huh. So _that's_ why he couldn't sleep on his back earlier. Tulio's anger drains as those fingers once more card through his loose hair. Then the idiot plops backward, making that squishy human death trap somehow look comfy.

Tulio turns to leave. A hand grabs his own. Boneless, he goes down.

 _I'm sorry_ is blared loud and clear across Miguel's face. Tulio manages a deadpan stare because, _really?_ Too little, too late.

With their souls already on the line, Tulio slings a conspiratorial arm around Miguel. His partner leans in avidly.

Tulio's plan grinds to a halt. What's a good signal for Chel? He waves his free hand to demonstrate her ample curves. At Miguel's blank stare, he instead holds up that hand to signal an... um, ample chest. Only then does the idiot purr in understanding.

Tulio snaps his fingers to make him focus. His smoldering stare and puckered lips are obvious instructions. When Miguel once more goes a little cross-eyed, Tulio jams two fingers in his face for good measure, because by gods are they on a deadline.

Miguel nods gamely. Before his partner can even pull away, he contentedly burrows his head into a pillow, and falls asleep right then and there.

Well, then.

Tulio considers the cold, cavernous bedroom awaiting him. His gaze flicks to the idiot beside him.

Here. Here is good.

He only wakes them up once that night, screaming wordlessly from the inevitable nightmares. He dreams himself hacked up piece by piece, yet still alive enough to feel as a hundred disembodied mouths chew into him. Which is still somehow preferable to the expected horror of being a moaning polyp in Eris' garden, powerless to prevent Miguel suffer that same fate again and again.

Despite his bleariness upon waking, Tulio understands immediately he's latched around Miguel.

He's back asleep in moments, and does not dream again.

* * *

_What I have I done? Athena, what I have I done?_

Triton orders the ocean scoured. There is no sign of Miguel, not even of that accursed octopus. How can there be one without the other?

His brave girls put on strong facades and search alongside the schools and the pods. Even the hippocampi whinny restlessly in their stables, gallop far and wide in search of the prince who sneaks them extra helpings of kelp. In his throne room, Triton leans over his trident. It shows him visions of everywhere under the sea, everywhere where he has forbidden Miguel to swim, the warnings his son always listened to with wide, wistful eyes.

His son is nowhere. He is in the gullet of a great shark, or rotting in some dark abyss.

Or hauled up by hunters, his embalmed body parts displayed as trophies.

"Well, keep looking," he tells a herald who reports only fruitless searches. "Leave no shell unturned, no coral unexplored. Let no one in this kingdom sleep until he's safe at home."

Until they find a body, there is hope. And hope Triton must.

He was never able to grant his Athena a proper funeral. He will not do the same for their baby boy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Screenshots show Tannabok and his wife with a good six young kids, so Chel's got a lot of baby brothers here. We know Ariel can write because of the contract, but why she never tries it on Eric? Duh, two totally different writing systems.
> 
> Mer folk are probably near-vegetarians. Predatory octopi? Eh, a cephalopod's gotta eat.


	7. create the mood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which idiots are idiots, but Eris' judge of character (and intelligence) somehow even worse.

Chel reflexively heads for Altivo's stall. Then she pauses, reconsiders her options, and turns for one of the carriage horses. The stallion whinnies in grave offense.

"You're gonna have to lug the buggy," she tells him flatly, "and the boys on top of it."

Gray ears flick madly. Pride wars with jealousy. The carriage horse stares placidly back at the Andalusian huffing bloody murder toward him.

Finally, Altivo snorts in surrender. This is how the prize Andalusian winds up hitched alone to a buggy over one of the usual carriers. Oh, Altivo's trained for it, might have pulled the carriage in a grand team for an emperor if Chel hadn't snapped him up first as a little girl. This is the day he chose, so Chel feels no guilt as he simmers in the harness.

Miguel and Tulio are up bright and early. From the shadows under Tulio's eyes she knows who woke up whom. Tulio dubiously eyes the buggy, sliding in like he's ready to jump ship at any moment. Chel settles on the other side, reins in hand. Miguel gleefully pops down between them. The seat is a bit snug for three, but it's cozy, and neither of her passengers complains about the closeness.

The ride into town starts easily enough. Altivo ambles calmly along. Miguel gesticulates wildly at everything he sees, from the flowering trees to the vibrant birds perched in them. Chel names them all. She can even blurt out a few quick facts sometimes before Miguel cuts her off with the next question. Tulio watches them with wide eyes, drinking it all in.

Then his wondrous expression slackens in horror. Chel squawks herself when she catches Miguel hanging upside down, mesmerized by the movement of Altivo's hooves. They haul him up together.

In town Miguel is no different. He peaks into wooden cages full of chickens to stroke their feathers. He splashes a hand into the fountain and tries dashing after children playing a ballgame. Tulio deftly snatches his shirt collar. Chel snorts a laugh at the ensuing pout.

Tulio holds himself back, but Chel isn't blind. Everything in the square is just as new to him, only he ogles at a polite distance instead of poking his nose into everyone else's business. Or grabbing puppets right from the hands of hapless puppeteers.

By the time Chel snatches the puppet from Miguel, she turns to discover Tulio has finally wandered off. Great.

To her horror, she discovers him in a side street, mesmerized by a dice game. Of course he is. She near drags him back by the pony tail before the other players inform her he's _winning._ Tulio puffs out his chest at his meager winnings. Miguel gapes in wonder. Chel rolls her eyes and hauls them both back before they plunge themselves into debt.

As promised, she takes them to the sights only Manoa can offer. They hold up great baskets to feed the great storks in their sacred garden. Tulio eventually stops flinching to stare up at them in awe. They grin like idiots among the dances of the pole, so thrilled by the sensation of flying they go twice more after. A turtle ride across the harbor brings them to the dominoes, where mortal men can mimic miracles if not make them. Some wild gesturing on Miguel's part is interpreted into a crescent moon, until the tiles tip nd a golden sun rises. Tulio, with great thought, has a white wave crest onto a verdant beach.

By the time they circle back to the square the musicians are out. Miguel lights up. After much squinting at the instruments, he snatches a guitar right from an old man's hands. The man's anger dissipates the moment Miguel stops strumming in experiment to actually _play._

All other musicians stop playing and crane their heads. Alone Miguel's song crests high as the tide, strong as the sea, gleeful as the dolphins that frolic in the wake of ships. Like those dolphins, one by one, the musicians follow in his wake, and swell into celebration. The dancers flow along, bending to a new melody.

Eventually Miguel sways with them. He wanders out from the musicians, wandering into the dance floor without trusting himself to follow them. His song soars where he cannot, into a new melody. Chel freezes as a dream comes into reality note by note, because that song on the beach had been...

_It - It can't be._

Before her fantasies can be crushed or confirmed, Tulio blunders his way into the thick of things. He bumps a shoulder against Miguel's, grinding the melody to a halt.

Twin grins split their faces. A new song begins as their feet finally moves in their own spinning, lurching dance. They bump into each other and other dances swerve to avoid them. Eventually they find their own grace, secret and gleeful. Chel's heart soars with them as much as she aches, that she does not have someone who can make her feel so... so _fearless._

Tulio's eye catches her own. With Miguel's hands currently occupied, it's him that drags her into their inner circle. They find their own rhythm, spinning and hip-bumping each other like idiots. Blissful, carefree idiots.

Over her head the boys share a grin. Miguel ramps up his melody once more while Tulio vaults ahead.

The square clears room, as Tulio spins and leaps as if gravity holds no dominion over him, as if his limbs don't realize they are not quite supposed to bend that way. Who cares if he wobbles precariously on the landings, and his grace not exactly the normal kind? What he lacks in traditional form he more than makes up in enthusiasm. And panache. Chel's heart hammers at his smoldering look. Miguel's guitar chokes and clams up, the music squealing to a halt.

It's still enough time for Tulio to throw himself out in one final flourish. Chel accepts the violet flower in gleeful bewilderment. Where had he even been keeping it?

A heartbeat later, six little birds unfold themselves from the stem, fluttering off into the sky. Chel gapes after them, as she remembers plundering the temple archives.

_It's... It's true! They're actually-_

"My birds!" screams a shopkeeper.

Chel turns to an empty cage, and an exotic animal dealer that watches his money quite literally fly off to freedom. Tulio smirks.

Chel peaks over his shoulder, half-expecting Miguel to be fuming in jealous rage. Over who, she's not even sure.

Instead he's retreated to the fountain, zealously splashing his face.

Oh. Of course he needs to cool down. All that frenzied playing and dancing must be exhausting after awhile.

* * *

Tulio leans contentedly back in the buggy. Its swaying, the melodic clop of Altivo's hooves, and the idyllic scenery are almost serene enough to nod off too. Even his company can't get any better.

Then Chel notices Miguel's questioning, innocent look. And horribly underestimates all that can possibly go wrong when she hands the reins off to him. Tulio's eyes bulge in horror. His warning shout of course goes unheard. Too late does Chel realize how widely Miguel grins. Tulio settles for clinging to the buggy for dear life when Miguel snaps the reins.

Altivo thunders. Altivo leaps.

Altivo barely clears the ravine. The buggy lurches, its wheels spinning backward, before the stallion finally tugs them forward.

Together Tulio and Chel gape back at their near demise, an oblivious Miguel, and then each other. They blink, then dissolve into quiet peals of laughter. Chel has to muffle hers. Tulio has the luxury of silence.

Gazing into her deep, dark eyes, his weird human heart flutters again. Like... Like...

Oh.

_Oh._

Oh, no. NononoNO.

Suddenly, this face and these instincts make terrible sense, why Eris had been so gleeful to lose out on another polyp for her garden.

Tulio glances up to the sky, searching for calm, and finds only a late afternoon sun careening for the horizon. Another day gone. Another day closer to-

His stomach heaves. He leans over the side, expelling his horror into the world. And doesn't stop, _can't_ stop.

For a terrible moment Tulio fears there's a clause in their contract against this, that Eris' magic has him dissolving from the inside out for daring to figure out her little plan for stealing Miguel forever. All because she had counted on him being selfish enough to steal enough for himself.

But then he's only coughing up bile, a day's gorging on human food finally all gone. Tulio's next impulse is to clutch Chel and Miguel both, sob, and scream against his silence that it's all his fucking fault they're in this mess. If he hadn't signed himself over too, hadn't sabotaged their budding relationship, then maybe-

No. No. There's still time to fix his fuck-up. Making these lovebirds fret over him instead only kills what's left of the mood.

So Tulio exhales a shuddering sigh, then another, each more even then the last. He locks his feelings down deep, manages a shaky and apologetic for smile Chel. Motion sickness and too much greasy food. Stupid him.

Miguel's mouth falls open doubtfully. Tulio's gaze cuts to him, before flicking upward. This time tomorrow Eris is coming for them both.

His partner swallows, summons up his brightest smile, and pretends everything is fine. Each on their own, they couldn't have withstood Chel's suspicious stares without blubbering out all the ugly, stupid truth. Together they con her as they have Miguel's sisters and tutors, even King fucking Triton himself.

Yes, Tulio isn't feeling too well. Pretty please, go on without him. Leave him to rest on shore with the buggy while they enjoy their little rowboat. Yes, really.

Tulio slumps across the seat, pretending to nap as they disembark. Through slanted eyes he watches Miguel row Chel off for their proper romantic escape. It's the perfect place for it. Now is the twilight time, the shadows soft and the sky rich lavender. The lagoon is a mirror, the frogs and birds surprisingly compelling ambiance. Miguel's worked wonders under far shittier circumstances, like zealous guards and voyeur dolphins.

Altivo stares after the rowboat, then snorts accusingly at him.

Tulio opens his eyes to roll them back. "Don't give me that look, horse. We both know where I belong."

Within an hour all should be right again. Chel can have her idiot for all time. Eris and her contract can go suck it. Miguel can have his legs, his voice, his princess, _and_ a life of adventure away from his dad's shitty influence. Tulio will have his freedom back, and his rightful body.

He imagines himself with all eight limbs restored. He'll have his siphons again, to properly breathe under his home.

He'll be a boneless cephalopod, stranded on shore, slowly suffocating from his own weight and the dry, ruthless air.

_Erk._

Tulio scrambles out of the buggy. He kneels on the bank, heedless of his stupid pants, and scoops water up with both hands.

He splutters at the bitter taste and spits it out. No matter. The salt water his human form finds revolting will be his source of survival again soon enough, but not quite yet. For now he kicks off his pinching shoes. He dips his feet into the water, toes wriggling into the mud. His nose wrinkles at the surprisingly pleasant sensation, and then the coolness of the grass as he leans back. He stares up at the darkening sky, in awe of each star that twinkles into existence, and waits.

His heart lurches at a startled yelp and the sound of two heavy objects splashing into the water. He stumbles to his feet and discovers two drenched idiots safely wading back into shallow water, Miguel with an arm slung over Chel's shoulder.

Did they... Is...

Tulio glances down at his own human form. Foolish hope rises in his chest. Can... Can he _stay?_

He tries to shout their voices, both at once.

And chokes on bitter silence.

So instead he wades out to help them up from the water. There are horse blankets in the buggy, enough to roughly towel down with and then to huddle into. They're still all wet, shivering wrecks by the ride home. This time Chel climbs her way between them, because she's the smallest and more than entitled to hog their body warmth after all the shit they've put her through these last two days.

Yeah. Suffice to say the mood has been killed dead tonight.

Tonight Tulio doesn't hesitate before exploding into Miguel's room. His partner stares outside, absently combing his hair with the freaking fork, and looks even more lost than when he signed his life and his voice away.

Tulio grabs his partner's shoulders. Miguel considers this obvious question. He pinches his fingers together, so closely they _nearly_ touch. His smile slips into a grimace.

Tulio falls back onto the bed, bewildered. That close? He'd come _that_ close to spending tonight back home, to... to...

Miguel plops down beside him. Tulio forces down overwhelming relief where he expects bitterness. One more night like this is not an unexpected blessing. There is such a thing as cutting it too close, when his partner's _eternal soul_ is on the line.

He wraps an arm around his partner's should and squeezes in comfort, in silent goodbye. This is Chel's world. This time tomorrow it will most certainly be Miguel's too. Just as it should be.

Tulio tries to treasure every hour. Instead he jerks awake to a dozen nightmares, each more horrific than the last. He watches Miguel shrivel into a polyp. In the dream after that Tulio is the main course at their wedding feast, and the one after _that_ he feels himself ooze back into an octopus right then and there, suffocating in Miguel's hold before he can be thrown back into the sea.

Worst yet is the one good dream he has, just before dawn. His selfish heart dredges up the desire of all three of them, whole and happy and _together,_ without sea or shore or hatred in the way. He aches, bone-deep, when he should have never known the sensation at all.

Tulio's eyes snap open once more. His longing keen is for his soul, and his soul alone.

He knows better than to sleep again. Instead he clings closer for Miguel, savors the sound of his even breathing, the tickle of his beard against his chin. How does Chel sound, when she dreams of better things? Does her mouth gape open like Miguel's, with a puddle of drool on her pillow and onto the one she leans against? Not like he'll ever know.

Human tears taste bitterly of home.

When Miguel finally stirs, he wipes them away, and manages a smile with the proper edge to it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember how Tulio's impulsive fling with Chel and breaking his own damned oath with Miguel near destroyed everything all three had going between them? Eris took one look at that seething little octopus and saw the perfect way to either distract Chel or make her lust after the wrong idiot.
> 
> Of course, we also know Eris turned out to be a shitty judge of character :p


	8. like a worm on a hook

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a goddess tries to sink a ship.

Tzekel-Kan is high priest and speaker of the gods. For all the royal line commands ephemeral, earthly power, his authority is _eternal._ He serves the Jaguar God, Lord of War and Lord of Destruction, and works his will on this plane. Tannabok is an unfortunate obstacle, but a man that can be cowed by the gaping weaknesses his numerous children pose. His brat of a daughter gets _clever_ when threatened, and worryingly spiteful.

Still, her drop of golden wisdom from the Sun God is sacred, and her hand worth its weight in gold. She might be wed off, stripped of her succession rights to buy Manoa more guns in the age of conquest and vengeance to come. But Chel has never served the people like she should. She's too stubborn to give up her claim, no matter the lives it might benefit.

And Tzekel-Kan is so very, _very_ tired of being mocked. First Chel has tried to stir up stories of some fantastical savior (or saviors), then she conveniently turns up such men with no pesky foreign allegiances, who cannot speak out a word against her. Flaunting them all over Manoa is the last straw.

The Jaguar God is a most elusive lord. He must be hunted down in dreams. His orders are cryptic visions Tzekel-Kan must ponder and interpret them appropriately. As the day dies, he leans over his brew that will send him into the height of visions. He chants the spells and prayers drilled into him since boyhood, flinging in each ingredient and votive offering as he should.

He is not done when the smoke stirs of its own accord, swells and rises into a new form. Tzekel-Kan promptly falls forward in full prostration even before those blazing eyes kindle to stare disdainfully down at him.

"As the prophecies foretold," he murmurs reverently, "the time of judgement is now. I-"

 _"Shut it,"_ hisses the shadows as they coalesce. _"I am so very much not in the mood tonight."_

First the smoky silhouette is amorphous. Only for fickle heartbeats is it feline or the broad conqueror Tzekel-Kan typically imagines when he prays. Then the lithe, terrible shape spreads wide, bat-like wings. This is not the jaguar shape that looms as the great idol, or the hulking warrior in the old texts, but an old likeness all the same etched into the temple walls.

"My lady," he soothes, as he considers his deity's current incarnation. "My only wish is to serve."

_"How convenient. Because I'm about to give you everything I want."_

The embodiment of death and destruction vows many long centuries of it. From it Manoa shall forge its empire, if it's strong enough to hold its conquests. He can even resurrect the old human sacrifices once offered up on her altars, a practice that unfortunately left by the wayside some centuries ago. Tzekel-Kan listens avidly.

Then his deity tells him the key to it all.

Tzekel-Kan bares his teeth in his brightest, bloodthirstiest smile.

* * *

What should be a nice, relaxing bubble bath takes an unpleasant turn when the cephalopod goes all _noble._ He is spineless to the core, longing after Triton's baby boy as much as he despises all the fish boy wants. He should be shredding their relationship apart, seizing on the princess' mutual lust, sew glorious chaos worthy enough to win Eris all the seven seas and the trident to rule it with.

Instead Eris watches in horror as a ship, against all odds, sets sail to victory.

These idiots have known each other for all of two days. One can't talk. The other doesn't know she faces the one who spared her life to drag her into a story far more interesting. Even by mortal standards, for a people that live and die like flies, _this_ is rather extreme.

Squinting into her bubbles does not change the look in those eyes. There's a heat there stronger than old dependable lust, though yet delicate as the bubbles themselves. Then their lips start creeping together. It shouldn't be anything true, anything near strong enough to actually _fulfill_ the agreement, and yet...

Eris violently tears a hand at the scene. Ligeia and Leucosia stir up enough of a wave to upend the rowboat, killing a kiss by mere inches.

"Nice work, girls, though pity you _didn't drown the bitch."_

The sirens shrink back, groveling in their own weepy way. For once Eris is in no mood to luxuriate in it. She is the goddess of discord, watching a plan spiral into chaos. With a long-suffering sigh she hauls herself up from her bath.

"It's time take matters into my own tendrils. If you want something done right, do it yourself."

And what fun there is yet to have.

Her special little zealot is all the accomplice she needs in this. After spending years hunting down her smallest glimpse he drinks up her commands and her empty, grandiose promises like they're his whole world. Delightfully, they actually are.

The next step requires a form more substantial than smoke and spite. Eris prefers borrowing faces for simplicity's sake, but this a special occasion. And she has just the perfect materials to craft with.

She plucks two tiny orbs from her teeth, weighing them in her tendrils. Then she shrugs.

She weaves her guise much the same, choosing only the best of their features. It will help sell the glamor, by borrowing from both. The stupid girl is still caught up in that dual, paradoxical fantasy.

A pity about the eyes, but what else is a good glamor for?

Eris cackles just to relish that two-toned voice, for these are true things not so easily blurred. The singing of the prince's voice is vital, and vastly more pleasant, but it's the other that's quicker in its answers, smoother in its retorts.

Both. Both is good.

* * *

Chel stares out at the sea. It has ebbed and flowed up this beach since long before Manoa, will continue to do so long after she herself is dust. Usually its quiet murmur gives her comfort. Tonight it only heightens her restlessness, stirs up the wondering whispers in her mind.

Chel is in love with a dream. She has been since realizing Tzekel-Kan will never let her vision for the kingdom usurp his own; not now, and not ever. Her comfort was the fantasy of a perfect partner, one wonderful enough to give up her throne for. At her most impossible they are bold and clever, able to attack angles she has never conceived of, and hurl down Tzekel-Kan once and for all. That is the future that hurts to even dream of, where Chel might have both her people and a love like the one her parents share.

Inevitably, she granted that dream a face, paradoxical as he was. His hair was the deep blue-black of night and golden as the sun, green as emeralds and blue as the deep sea. She even made up a beautiful voice to soothe her, a warm hand to cradle her face and hold her steady through even the roughest waters.

She cranes her gaze upward. Illuminated in the window are two men of flesh and blood. They are utter strangers to her. She knows nothing of their past but their names and that they survived terrible things upon the sea. But they are also one mean guitar player and an oddly elegant dancer. Her brothers have latched onto them, crawled into their laps over dinner for pantomimed stories and braided hair. They like gambling and forks and confusing the hell out of her.

Their faces are obscured by the angle, but she can still their arms and hands wave in silent conversation. Miguel tilts trustingly up to Tulio, who leans tenderly back. Their love is loud and clear, for all she has never heard a single word from either. And Chel aches for something like that.

...Well, no. She wants _that._

Chel turns back to the misty beach as she recalls the last two days, all the invasions of privacy and personal space met with only easy, careless smiles. When she surreptitiously tried to ogle, two other pairs had stared back with far less discretion. She considers a dance with three partners, an offered flower and a thwarted kips. Her lips still tingle from Miguel's beard, the warmth of his breath. They had come _that_ close. She wants _closer._ From both of them, to knock down the wall Tulio seems hellbent on raising when none of them, not even _Tulio,_ wants it.

She has known them for all of two days.

She wants a lifetime more. A life without her throne would not be such a terrible one, if there were such adventures to be had, and such partners to share it with.

But first she needs time and the chance to truly know these men. They deserve no less from her. Partnerships of two are hard enough. All of Chel's attempts have ended in icy relations and scuttled treaties. Adding an extra person to the mix is new, uncharted territory. Maybe their bond might grow strong enough to withstand every storm and rocky shoal life throws at them.

Or maybe it won't. How will she ever know if she wallows in a dream, and lets these men pass her by?

So Chel turns her back to the sea, and all she dreams within it. It's already spit up all she needs.

She's already striding back inside when the wind shifts. She freezes. What she can first dismiss as wishful thinking grows louder as the heartbeat, that faint melody swelling into a true song, real as the cool night air prickling her skin into goosebumps.

Chel peers over the balcony to behold a fantasy made flesh, somehow all she ever dreamed and more.

The dream seizes her.

And never lets her go.


	9. right before your eyes

Miguel wakes up in lean, warm arms. Blearily he wonders what he's doing with one of his old flames, before he feels legs tangled in legs, and the caterwaul of gulls outside. He gazes into deep blue eyes and smiles his brightest. His partner manages a sardonic one, before rolling away and stretching out sore limbs.

Today is the day.

It has to be.

The servants, not surprised in the slightest this time to find them together, just carry in both their pairs of clothes. Miguel easily starts dressing himself this morning. He'll be doing it quite a bit more now. Even Tulio, with three days of finger experience, manages it. He's still struggling with the buttons. Miguel swoops in before a servant can. His work is quick, but his fingers linger a bit too long.

Because it hits him this is the very last day they will ever be proper partners, look each other eye to eye. Tulio is about to return to his proper shape and his proper home. Miguel's trading in his tail for a life on land, a life with Chel.

When they get their voices back, will they be able to speak to each other again? True humans can't understand fish folk. Tulio will only have his eyes and tentacles, subtle communication further obscured by the plane of seawater between them.

Tulio's breath hitches too. Then he rolls his eyes and wrenches himself away.

On the way out, the servants forget propriety, and start whispering once more about today's surprise wedding. _Chel's_ surprise wedding.

...What?

He and Tulio both splutter after the servants, though of course their questions go unheard. Then Tulio narrows his eyes at _him._

_I-I couldn't even get the stupid kiss last night! Do you think I squeezed in a proposal too?_

His furious indignity eventually chases the suspicion from Tulio's face. His brow arches in another question. Miguel shrugs hopelessly back. How is _he_ supposed to know if Chel's sort of romantic spontaneity includes binding, life-long commitments? Miguel's marriage experience is blanking out in existential horror whenever his dad or sisters dare bring up the concept.

They barrel out of their room, tripping over each other and their own damn feet.

Miguel freezes on the staircase. His partner slams into him. Rigid horror keeps them standing.

"Well," Queen Miya manages. "It-It appears as if your... mystery man does... in fact exist."

King Tannabok says nothing. His stony silence is enough to crush a man.

"Oh, Lord Paris most certainly exists," purrs a vile man that can only be the infamous Tzekel-Kan. "How fortuitous his eye fell upon our dear princess when it did."

Chel stands like a statue, face blank. Her eyes, dark and brilliant, are dull and seem to stare at nothing. "We wish to be married as soon as possible."

"W-Wouldn't you like a proper betrothal first, dear?" her mother tries, increasingly strained. "It-"

"Nonsense!" Tzekel-Kan booms. "Your daughter is the future queen, delivered from death by the man that deserves to lead our nation into its glorious new future. The omens call for a wedding this very afternoon, between sea and sky. We can't go disappointing the gods, hm? Much less your dear daughter."

"Chel?" King Tannabok rumbles. "Is this what _you_ truly want?"

"The wedding ship departs at sunset," is her only reply.

Miguel's horrified gaze strays from her to Lord Paris. He should be handsome, with a long face and lean nose like Tulio's. _Disturbingly_ like Tulio's, though the hair is dark blond, and his stubble thicker. Only those features that aren't Tulio's are the same Miguel sees in his own reflection, down to the shape of his eyes. Only Lord Paris' eyes aren't deep blue _or_ green. They're bright red and lurid yellow.

The goddess of discord squeezes an arm around Chel's shoulder.

"Of course, my love," she purrs in a voice not her own. _"Anything_ for you."

Tulio staggers back at the sound of his stolen voice. Miguel clenches his fists and stalks forward, until his partner's arm clenches around him in a desperate vise.

Miguel struggles against him for only a few heartbeats. Then his incandescent rage sinks back into horror. Chel is enthralled, tucked between his father's sworn enemy and a high priest that despises her. His contract, _Tulio's_ contract, binds them to Eris, and Eris to her word.

No such protections extend for Chel. Miguel, in his naivety, had taken her safety as a given. How is he supposed to get his kiss if she's... she's...

When had Eris ever promised to play fair?

He can only watch as Chel is swept along into wedding preparations, trembling in fear and fury.

* * *

So Eris enthralled Chel and has made her into a hostage, because there's nothing in that contract to stop her from being a petty bitch. Swell.

There is also nothing in that contract that prevents Tulio from sabotaging the hell out of that wedding.

...Not that much of his plans have yet had much success against the freaking chaos goddess. Miguel's heroic attempts to break into her chambers result in broken trellises and unpleasant slips from the roof. Maids keep shooing him out from bride-only areas. And chefs from the kitchens before he can screw up the feast. The wedding barge refuses to sink or catch alight. Instead Tulio burns his stupid fingers. Apparently Eris can muffle chaos when it pleases her to.

And Eris is not the only one hellbent on seeing this farce through. Tzekel-Kan's large, scary soldiers and acolytes loom around every corner. Only the fig leaf of the king's guest right keeps them from being thrown into the dungeons. The staff happily bleats on about how the princess has finally discovered her true love, that she and the splendid Lord Paris will happily live ever after. Even Tzekel-Kan has seen the light and will bless their union. How blessed Manoa is, to have its high priest and future queen cooperating so harmoniously. Everything is finally as it should be.

The king and queen, with such brutes looming over their children for 'protection,' stew in silence.

But not every person in the castle has their hands tied, or is willfully blind to the doom in their midst.

"She's bewitched, isn't she?" Naui murmurs.

At Tulio's grim nod, Yei explodes. "Of course she is! That stupid guy has _red_ eyes! Why is everyone calling them brown?"

"Because they're stupid?" Ome queries.

Matla heaves a long-suffering sigh. "Because _they're_ bewitched."

"...Oh."

Then all four of Chel's brothers bombard them with ideas in how to stop the wedding or, better yet, break the spell. Suggestions range from showing Chel 'Lord Paris'' true reflection to _stabbing Lord Paris in the back._ They all stop and gawk at Yei.

"...What?"

Dragging a hand down his face, Tulio makes it clear through some very stern pantomiming these adorable, proactive brats are not to infere in any way. They fiercely argue back. Miguel, the sap, promptly crumbles. Tulio doesn't prove himself much better when he concedes the boys can _nonviolently_ stall the wedding, if and only if the ceremony ever gets under way.

"Why not a true love's kiss?" Naui murmurs.

"Yeah!" Ome pipes up. "That always solves the problem! But... which one should she-"

Matla matter-of-factly rolls his eyes. "Both, duh."

"Tulio first?"

"Nuh uh, Miguel!"

"Tulio!"

"Miguel!"

"Don't be silly! She's gotta kiss them both _at the same time!"_

As the boys devise increasingly complex solutions to this logistical problem, Tulio finally shuts them up with much blushing and furious fingers pressed to their lips. And not a moment too soon. He hauls Miguel out the nursery window before a maid comes to collect the royal princes.

By the time the royal family is bundled onto the barge, the sun is sinking fast. Shielded by his soldiers, Tzekel-Kan catches their eyes in the crowd of well-wishers, and smirks.

"So sorry!" he calls in delight. "Nobles only!"

_Miguel's blood is freaking **divine,** you psycho f- Um, Miguel? Hey, Miguel!_

Tulio gapes as his partner stalks off in the entirely wrong direction. The idiot isn't giving up, is he? So help him, Tulio will _swim_ him out to that barge before-

Miguel sharply turns. Tulio's nose wrinkles at the stench of manure. From a sea of long, unfamiliar faces one in particular sticks out. He lashes his furiously against his stall door, bugling furiously at the sight of them. Altivo has been confined here since catching one whiff of Chel's slimy new betrothed and trying to trample him dead.

Miguel throws the door open. Tulio instinctively clambers up after him, clinging for dear life. His partner dips his fingers deep into the stallion's mane, and presses his legs to urge him faster.

Out in the open Altivo surges like the wind incarnate. Before his snorting fury soldiers drop their weapons and bolt out of the way.

The barge is already pulling away from the dock. They reach the end, with nowhere to go but-

Altivo leaps.

Altivo soars.

Miguel pushes from his back, grasping for the rigging.

Tulio does not remember reaching after him. But somewhere down the line he goes from clinging to Miguel's back to clinging to the mast for dear life. His partner helps him to his feet. Together they tower above the crowd.

The very, very frazzled crowd. The deck is a mess of upturned tables and chairs. Chel's brothers, wearing cake frosting as warpaint, hurl wedding cake and kick shins at any soldiers that seem to be rallying. Altivo charges through the chaos. Eris and Tzekel-Kan wheel away to opposite sides to avoid flailing hooves. Chel stands in the thick of it all, more bewildered by the second.

Wedding thoroughly ruined. Now wha-

Below, Eris shrieks in two-toned rage as Miguel seizes his face, and mashes it against his own.

What?

_What?_

...Oh.

Miguel pulls away, blushing and fierce and brilliant.

Tulio splutters after him. "W-Wh... _WHAT?_ "

He touches a hand to a stubbly, human throat, and inhales another impossible breath.

_OH._

_"STOP THAT WEDDING!"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We all know the end to these sorts of stories. The important thing is the fluff we earned along the way :D
> 
> 'Paris' named himself for the lovingly stupid prince that started Eris' finest work - the Trojan War.


	10. binding (and completely unbreakable)

This has been the longest, weirdest dream of Chel's life. What should end with an idealized wedding instead spirals into weirdness. It begins with her brothers ripping off their clothng and going full warrior over the wedding cake. Then her parents join in, Dad using whole tables to shove Tzekel-Kan's acolytes overboard. Mom settles for using the chairs to wallop them unconscious.

Altivo flies in. So glad he could make it after all. Of course he was invited. He's her best friend! And he even has the courtesy to try permanently disposing of Tzekel-Kan, though she doesn't quite understand what his grudge against Paris is. Maybe she should-

_"STOP THAT WEDDING!"_

As if struck by lightning, Chel twitches away, and truly opens her eyes.

The carnage of the wedding barge is not dream. Neither is her cake-splattered, frilly nightmare of a gown, or the idiots melodramatically perched in the rigging above.

"Y-You can talk?"

Miguel blinks. He glances down at himself, over at Tulio, and then beams down at her. "Apparently I can!"

An ungodly, inhuman shriek tears itself from the throat of her betrothed. "How dare you... you slimy, invertebrate _cheats!"_

Tulio guffaws. "Hah! You played yourself, sweetheart!"

Chel's heart lurches. That's the voice she heard from Paris' throat, so curiously dissonant from his singing. It sounds so much more natural in Tulio's throat, punctured by his smarmy grins than over Paris' smug, perfect poise.

Chel's horrified gaze slants to the monster that was nearly her bridegroom. His eyes burn red and gold, not mundane brown. His face is an unholy amalgamation of the boys above, just as stolen as their voices. The shadows reflected there in the deepening dusk belong to no human face. But the horror's rage is fixated upward, the voice from his throat high and hateful.

"You broke your word!"

Tulio shrugs. "Not our fault your stupid contract didn't actually specify _whose_ kiss he had to get."

Miguel beams at them both. "And the answer was staring us right in the face the whole time!"

His partner quirks an incredulous grin. "Yeah... It kinda was, wasn't it?" He rolls his eyes down at Chel. "Though to be fair, we got stupid lucky. I mean, true love in three days' time? We were morons to even agree to those terms."

"The biggest," Miguel agrees. "Tulio, I'm so-"

"I know, partner, I know. And I'm especially-"

Their tearful reconciliation is sweet, really, and the perfect distraction Chel needs. She picks up a fallen sword and stabs it through Paris' back, right through where his heart should be.

It passes through him like smoke. The monster arches an unimpressed brow at her, the disguise melting away into a flowing gown and black tendrils of hair.

"How original," the goddess of discord drawls. She drifts away from the deck, looming larger and larger, until she towers over the night.

Below Tzekel-Kan laughs triumphantly. "And so dawns a new era! The age of the-"

The goddess rolls her eyes, but her glower is not for him, or for Chel. Even from the rigging, the boys are dwarfed by her.

"We had a deal!" Tulio growls, pushing his partner behind him. "Like it or not, Eris, we won!"

"So you did," the goddess muses. "You got your voice back, cousin dear, and the humanity you craved. You had your life with your love. I never promised you a _long_ one."

She reaches behind Tulio, to pluck Miguel from his arms. He lunges after them with a horrible cry, to be unceremoniously flicked to the deck. With a frantic whinny, Altivo intercepts his fall, catching him over his broad back. They all hopelessly stare after the goddess prowling into deeper waters, a struggling Miguel in her grip.

Tulio charges right after him, diving overboard. Altivo whinnies angrily after the idiot.

Chel, with slightly more sense, cuts a lifeboat loose. She hopes to discover Tulio's true form, sleek and graceful in the sea, streaking off in hot pursuit.

Instead she uses an oar to fish on flailing, drowning idiot out of the water.

 _"You_ saved _me_ from drowning?"

Tulio hacks up water into the boat. "T-To be fair, _this entire body_ is a relatively recent development."

"So I figured."

She shoves the oars into his arms. He starts rowing like a madman, so Chel stoops down to ready their one insurance.

"D-Do you think that'll be enough?"

She scowls at the whale harpoon. "I'll _make_ it enough."

Her father, with more sense than all of them put together, roars for the fleet. Because he is a king sitting not that far from his nation's esteemed port, his finest sailors having just witnessed a giant woman kidnap someone from the royal wedding barge.

So of course that's when the colossal sea monster erupts from the deep.

Tulio doesn't bat an eye at the rolling waves and thundering bellows. His stare never wavers from the figure in Eris' fist.

When they both vanish beneath the water, he only rows faster.

* * *

Eris is chaos incarnate. She has no place in this world, especially in an ocean fickle enough in its own right. Triton and his line have ruled for centuries under the solemn oath as Kings and Queens of the Sea, to hold the balance, so that the waters may never again boil or drown the land in great deluges. When his trident starts thrumming ominously, so soon after his baby boy went missing, things snap into place.

Triton is King of the Sea. The waters bend to his thrall, propel him on enchanted currents to where his people need him to once more banish discord into its dark abyss.

The bay beyond thunders with cannon fire as human ships fire upon Cetus, a leviathan that is less playing with its food than fighting for its life. It is the goddess himself he fixates on, so smug and gleeful before him.

"Eris!" he rumbles. "Stop!"

"Why, King Triton!" she coos. "It's quite the family reunion tonight!"

Triton dispassionately considers the human drowning between them. Every time he swims for the surface, Eris twirls her finger, creating yet another vortex to drag him under.

"Humanity means nothing to me," he scoffs. "You know that well."

"Surely you want to make an exception just this once, cousin dear?"

Triton glares at her needling, knowing tone. He stares beyond those billowing clothes and thrashing limbs, and recognizes something in that silhouette. His trident lights up the surrounding sea. That man's face is Miguel's, eyes wide and wild. His scream escapes as only a faint stream of bubbles. Triton watches his boy, a son of the sea, drown before his very eyes.

He slashes his trident their way, to break this twisted curse. The spell lands to no avail.

"Let him go!"

Eris laughs. "Oh, cousin dear, I'm quite afraid he did this to himself. He so thoroughly disowned his old self that you can't call him yours anymore."

Triton's heart drops. But he can't think any further when his son is still struggling, and dying by the second.

Once more his trident curves. This time the waters bend into an air bubble, drawing fresh oxygen from the surrounding sea. Miguel stops thrashing to fall to the bottom. His lungs heave for breathe. His spluttered gasping horrifies Triton as much as it quiets his pounding heart.

"D-Daddy, I'm s-sorry, s-so so-"

"Oh, please," Eris scoffs, summoning a contract in triumphant flourish. "We all know what you agreed to."

Triton still tries to vaporize it on basic principal. It holds under the same cosmic laws that command them all, even discord incarnate. He seizes it himself, more betrayed with every line he reads. And yet-

"My son did it," Triton breathes, his voice stronger by the word. "He fulfilled your bargain, Eris. He isn't your property!"

"Unfortunately so," she sighs with a nasty grin. "Then again, he's not yours either. Just because I don't get a new polyp for my garden doesn't mean I can't just take his pathetic, mortal life. He _is_ human, after all."

Miguel snarls a curse at her, yet never denies it. His form resisted a spell intended to only save his life, to restore him to his true self.

"Name your terms," Triton grits out.

The goddess taps her chin. "The life of a Sea Prince is a very precious commodity, but... I might be willing to make an exchange for someone even better."

"Drown me!" Miguel roars. "I'm not-"

"Hush." Eris taps his bubble, icing the whole thing over. The muffled screams of rage inside prove him still very much alive. "The grown-ups are talking."

Triton's stomach roils. He is the Sea King, beholden to the ocean and all creatures in it. He is a father to six other children, no less precious. How can he risk them all for one prodigal son? Even Miguel agrees on that point.

"Athena forgive me," he breathes.

Bargaining is selfish beyond belief.

Yet bargain he does.

* * *

There's a lot of glowing under the water. Chel squints down at the cloud of darkness around it. She aims as best she can, prays, and _hurls._

Below them there's a hideous shriek, an explosion, and then something explodes out of the waves. Tulio leans over to haul a gasping Miguel aboard.

"Did we do it?"

"...Well, yes and no."

The ocean heaves and churns, as the darkness beneath swells. Tulio rows like their lives depend on it. Eris rises to tower above their dumb little dinghy, now with a spiky golden crown and an ominous trident.

"You pitiful, insignificant fools!" she booms. "I am the bane of armies and the destroyer of empires! Now I am the ruler of all the ocean! The sea and all its spoils bow to my power!"

Their rowboat is sucked down by the yawning vortex that opens all the way up to the seafloor, spewing up ancient shipwrecks. They scramble away from its remnants, though they are penned in on all sides by the swirling waters.

"Hey, Eris!" Chel and Miguel whirl to discover their partner missing. Instead he has stormed the opposite way. He proves himself either the bravest or the stupidest man alive by chucking a rock at a goddess' hemline. "Not bad for a little cephalopod, huh? I only fucked things up for _the goddess of discord!_ Guess you should've given me an uglier face!"

Eris raises a clenched fist. Then she inhales deeply and summons up something far scarier than blind range - glee.

"No," she hums, lowering the trident. "I'm going to _savor_ this."

Tulio yelps as a beam of lightning misses him on purpose. Where he runs Eris follows, singing his clothes and hair without vaporizing him entirely. He is the mouse, and she the cat who enjoys playing with its prey too much.

And Chel's gonna be the mouse that makes her choke on it.

"Miguel!" she hisses, tugging at his sleeve.

Green eyes squint after hers. They race for a shipwreck just heaving itself up from the seafloor, snagging onto its rusted anchor. It takes both of them to wrestle against years of decay holding the wheel firm.

It's Chel who holds their course. She stares the goddess down as they barrel down. They face her with unwavering faith and unwavering love for the reckless idiot below.

Their opponent is an immortal goddess, great and terrible. They are two lovesick idiots in a wrecked boat.

King Triton traded his crown, and himself, for the lives and well-being of every last one of his children. No matter what, he will always love Miguel, be him a merman or an idiot about to kill himself over a princess and a cephalopod.

A goddess' word is her bond.

Rather than dash the ship to pieces and consign its riders to a watery grave, Eris' being willfully lets it impale her through the heart.

She gasps raggedly, collapsing as floodwaters come rushing down upon them all.

_Oh f-_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me trying to write this chapter, upon realizing the earler narrative choices that now prevented Chel from stabbing Eris with a shipwreck: BSOD.
> 
> And then I remembered Eris is a petty, petty bitch, fuming over a loophole. So she makes one of her own. Miguel wins her bargain. He gets his humanity. Nothing in that agreement said she couldn't drown his ass afterward. And there's nothing Triton can do once Miguel's heart makes it very clear he ain't being 'helped' against his will, not ever again.
> 
> Also, Triton is the freaking King of the Sea. If a chaos goddess is trying to stir up shit in his ocean he shouldn't need a crab to warn him. But beneath the bluster he is also a sap with no willpower, so of course he'd agree to damn near anything that lets his kids go unharmed.
> 
> And Eris is a goddess of her word ; )


	11. part of your world

Tulio drifts in bottomless blue, utterly human and utterly octopus, both whole and without form. He is finally at peace, for now and forever.

Then a hand slams against his back and paradise comes to a rude demise.

Eyes flying open, Tulio hacks up seawater for the third time in as many days. But this is the best time yet, because there are two gentle hands rubbing at his back, and two friends to help hoist him up.

"Are we dead?" he croaks.

"Far from it!" Miguel laughs, seizing his face to kiss him again.

Tulio feels the sleepy parts of him come fully back to life as he sits ramrod straight. This time he does his damnedest to kiss back. He has a lifetime to perfect lips and tongue. But Miguel falls back with dizzy ecstasy, so Tulio smugly reckons he's off to a decent start.

Chel laughs, leaning over to smoosh his cheeks between her soft, soft hands. "Nice going, partner!" He and Miguel freeze, gaping at her in bewilderment. She smiles sheepishly, pulling back. "Er, or not. I'm-"

...Both.

Both is good.

Tulio turns to Miguel in mock-seriousness. "Well, partner? Does Chel merit the title of 'partner-in-training?'"

Miguel hums noncommittally. "She _did_ stab the chaos goddess with a sword."

"Yes, yes. But then she went and _impaled Eris with a shipwreck."_

"So...?"

As one, they grin and hold out their hands. "Partners?"

Chel heaves a sobbing laugh, tackling them both to the beach in her crushing hug. They both their kisses after all, and then some.

It's not true love, not quite yet. But it's a hell of a beginning.

New, as of yet unexplored parts of his humanity stir most eagerly at this arrangement. Tulio's about to suggest breaking them in when he happens to glance up. He _eeps_ in horror as he beholds the figure awkwardly loitering offshore.

"Miguel," he whispers. "Pst, Miguel. I think you need to take this one."

Their partner gawks out to where the freaking _King of the Sea_ awaits. He sighs and sits up, running a hand through his hair to shake out some of the sand. This isn't Miguel's first time being caught red-handed. He just so happens to have another lover more than usual, and a lot more extra limbs involved. "Yeah," he mumbles. "I promise I'll be right back."

Miguel squeezes their hands in reassurance. Neither lets him go. They all wade out to the shallows together, to meet King Triton in the thin line between two worlds. Tulio and Chel eye the merman in cool suspicion, ready to haul their partner back the moment that trident swings his way.

King Triton's face shifts inscrutably. _"This_ is what you choose?"

Miguel juts out his chin defiantly. "Every damn day for the rest of my life."

A cool sweat beads on Tulio's neck when he falls under the king's gaze. But this time he has a spine, both physically and metaphorically, and returns that stare as best he can. "You are the octopus, are you not?"

"Former octopus."

King Triton swallows a scowl. "Then this is not your home either. There... There are... _ways,_ to ensure your mutual happiness right down where you belong."

Tulio grins. "Nah. I already have everything I need right here."

The merman pinches his nose long and hard before fixating on Chel. "You... are the girl?"

She regards him in icy politeness. "I am called Chel, your majesty."

"Princess Chel of Manoa, actually," Miguel amends sternly.

"Princess Chel," King Triton grinds out in surrender. "My son and his... partner will never be able to fully grant you their heart. In turn you will always have to divide your love between them. How can anyone, human or fish folk, settle for that?"

"Love is not a commodity, your majesty," she retorts with her most serene, spiteful smile. "There'll always be more out of it out in the world."

Deep eyes appraise them all, before King Triton sighs. "Then I guess there's only one problem left."

Miguel scoffs. "And what is that?" 

"Just how much I'm going to miss you."

Miguel breaks then. With a sob he staggers away from his partners to embrace his father. Against his broad chest he looks half a little boy again. "I-I love you, Daddy!"

"And I love you too, Miguel," King Triton murmurs, soft as the hushing tide. "I only wish I told you it more often, before..."

"...What?" Chel cuts in. "Are you two saying goodbye _forever?"_

Father and son tilt their head in bewilderment. "Um, yes?"

_"Why?"_

"The difference between legs and a tail is kind of a big one, Chel," Tulio mumbles to her.

"Yes, but he's still your _dad."_

Miguel strains for a smile. "It's hardly a succession crisis, Chel. I have six older sisters ahead of me for the throne, so dynastically speaking I'm rather-"

"You're abandoning _six sisters_ too?"

"Um..."

Tulio is not safe from Chel rounding on him. "And what about you?"

He rubs an awkward shoulder as he considers his long dead parents and the couple dozen siblings out of thousands that survived the hatchling phase. He's alienated from every single one of them. "...No one that isn't already long dead to me." Chel's face falls. "Hey, for my original species, that's a totally natural thing. We're..."

Tulio gets hugged anyway.

Then he gets to watch in wide-eyed amazement as Chel somehow coerces Miguel's dad down to the decks for a more extended conversation. King Tannabok and Queen Miya have ruled together for over two decades. They are no strangers to foreign diplomacy, though King Triton has to be the first monarch of the nonhuman variety they've treated with. Queen Miya has the foresight to bring wine. Lots and lots of wine.

There is much drinking. And crying. Lots and lots of crying. First over Miguel and his dad finally opening up to each other for the first time in a damn decade, and then all over the heartfelt apologies Miguel and Tulio spew out to each other.

There are also hugs. So many hugs.

With actual, well-adjusted adults on hand to direct communication, they come to an agreement.

* * *

"On three, we jump in and find out what your dad's magic is made out of."

Tulio grimaces down at the water, lapping at the edges of the dock. They stand out at the very edge, where the water will come up to well over their heads. Chel vibrates with excitement. Miguel looks somewhere vaguely between homesick and like he's about to be actually sick.

"Um..."

"I'm the future fucking Queen of Manoa," Chel tells them matter-of-factly. "If I wind up stuck as a mermaid you're sure as hell my mom will find a way to swim down there and give Triton a very stern talking to. How are we supposed to be ambassadors between worlds if we're stranded on one?"

"They can come to us," Tulio mutters. "We can set up an office in a boathouse or something."

Miguel sighs. "If they're merfolk, sure, but what about the fish folk without any lungs at all?"

Tulio sighs in resignation. "On three?"

Miguel squeezes his hand back. "On three."

"One, tw-"

Chel leaps, dragging them both down with her. Tulio, caught mid-squeal, reflexively inhales a lungful of seawater.

Which is actually what the very detailed parameters of the spell call for. They had read up on ancient lore of mer-folk and close cousins transforming back from a human shape by a mere drop of water or a full moon. Their spell calls for nothing less than deliberately breathing underwater to trigger the shift. The transformation back in turn requires fresh air and the intention of leaving the water behind.

One blinding stream of bubbles later, Tulio is spluttering indignantly underwater and not drowning for it. "W-What happened to _three?"_

His partners don't answer. They instead stare dumbly at him. Tulio stares back, tentacles curling in dread.

What? Miguel damn near _grew up_ with Tulio's true...

_Oh._

He flexes all eight of his tentacles, to assure each one accounted for. Then he clenches two unexpected additions.

"Huh." Human hands trail down a lean torso, brushing where pale skin melds into deep blue flesh. "This is... new."

"Very new," Miguel squeaks, unable to rip his eyes away.

Chel can't even take the time to appreciate her own tail. "I... I've never seen a merman like that before."

"That's because apparently I'm a cecaelia now." Tulio rolls his eyes at Miguel. "Subtle your dad is not."

Miguel purrs. "But very persuasive."

Tulio' shamelessly leers at the other very obvious bribe. "I'll say."

Chel flexes her lionfish tail, striking and powerful as she is. She smiles wondrously, before tapping at her brand new seashell bra. "I... have questions. So many questions."

Tulio frowns down at his own new anatomy. "So do I."

He's had no reason to know the intimate details of cecaelia before. They're prefer colder waters than those around Atlantica and aren't too common in the kingdom itself. But he does know they live long, boring lives of raising relatively few children just like merfolk do. Considering most octopi die soon after reproducing once, that knowledge is _very_ reassuring.

Miguel hums. "I have... very intimate knowledge on both subjects, just to let you know."

Tulio rolls his eyes as he considers that long list of conquests. "Trust me, Miguel, I _know."_

"Do you, Tulio? Do you _really?"_

He opens his mouth, considers the radiant mer prince before him, and closes it.

* * *

Eventually and inevitably, there is a wedding. No one was in that great a rush for it, what with all the personal discovery and growth yet to have been accomplished. All the adventures across land and sea in those years were crazy distractions. So were the other fun escapades had along the way.

Around the same time, they all start thinking it's maybe time to take matters even further. Not just because two kingdoms just won't stop dropping hints already, because those suggestions only make them drag their feet more on the subject, but because they're all damn well _ready_ for that step.

Their minds made up, a few more awkward weeks are spent dancing around the suspicions of others, wondering if their partners know if _they_ know. And who's moving first. In the end their nerves snap and they all spontaneously spew out their proposals at the same damn time. After they blink at each other there is much relieved laughter and far more exciting things that happen after.

Really, their answers are all a given at this point. They never technically bother when they reached that agreement long ago.

There's less debate about the actual ceremony itself than an outsider might think. Chel is the future Queen of Manoa. Her parents have been hinting for years they'd happily step aside and raise the rest of their brood in peace if she declares herself ready for the responsibility. It's her family Miguel and Tulio are marrying into. As her family can't breathe underwater barring extreme magical interference, they compromise with the stupid wedding barge so the grooms' side of the family don't have to awkwardly cluster around shore.

For a Manoan royal, the ceremony is performed by the high priestess. She's young, not much older than Chel herself, and gushes with excitement during her heartfelt speech. She is a follower of wise old Grandmother Turtle, and the brightest star in a new generation of religious reformation.

Polyamorous marriage has been legal in Manoa since times untold. Their people are especially blessed their princess chose to take two sons of the sea as consorts. Miguel is a Prince of Atlantica, son of the Sea King. Tulio is Lord of the Sunken City, for Eris has made herself scarce in the waters as of late and Triton will be damned before he lets his baby boy marry a _commoner._

Tzekel-Kan is long vanished at sea. Queen Miya sorrowfully claims she saw him dragged off by Cetus, the goddess' great beast. No one sees a reason to doubt her.

While Chel's side of the wedding party watches from the barge, those of the grooms gaze up from above. Altivo snorts down in wonderment at the herd of hippocampi. The massive seahorses stare right back. All six of Miguel's sisters sob in open joy. Their father thinks his thick beard hides his better. No one has the heart to tell him otherwise. From the mast Scuttle binges more rice than he tosses. Sebastian sniffles back his tears to grace land _and_ sea with his finest masterpiece yet.

On Tulio's side of the family huddle a dozen or so blue octopi, bemused by the surrounding chaos. They wave awkward tentacles up at the weirdest brother of the bunch. Towering above the whole wedding party, the barge itself, are the two Tulio might charitably call grandparents. Grandpa Pontus manifests only from the waist-up, with a seaweed beard. Grandma Thalassa, her hair sea foam and her clothing bands of seaweed, waves serenely as they pass.

"Are... Are they really your grandparents?" Chel whispers out of the corner of her mouth.

"Technically," Tulio mutters. "All sealife except the monsters are spawned from them. I guess out of the billions of grandkids I'm the one weird enough to warrant a visit."

She considers this, and then peers out at Miguel's merfolk family. "Then does that mean-"

Her husbands groan and both lean down to kiss her.

There are some discussions that will never be had. That is one of them.

Awkwardness and overly friendly families aside, they all live happily ever after.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a shameless, indulgent romp I literally banged out in four days. Thank you for putting up with me XD
> 
> From the attitudes in the original movie, Ariel is saying all but goodbye to her old life. Chel, who actually grew up in a healthy and stable family, ain't letting the divides be that stark.
> 
> Upon mating, octopi females lay their eggs and waste away over them. The bodies of the males break down and die. Most of those thousands of tiny hatchlings don't survive very long. Given what we know of Ursula and her sister in the sequel, the cecaelia/octopids have, er, more merfolk-typical life cycles and sexuality.
> 
> Pontus and Thalassa are very primordial Greek sea gods in Greek myth, progenitors of all sea life, and by technicality Tulio's distant grandparents too. And probably related to Triton and his family much more closely. Given the naming schemes Disney went with (and a Greek discord goddess as a villain), I couldn't help but poke fun XD

**Author's Note:**

> Miguel, Classical Dreamworks' closest thing to a Disney Princess, is obviously the Ariel here. In a bit of cosmic shuffle, the Chel of this story is the daughter of Tannabok and his wife, with many much younger siblings and a high priest eager to marry her off so he can just off her dad and install a regency already. It's around... 1800sh here maybe, that vague Disney-ish era we take at face value and don't squint at much further. 
> 
> I was considering Tzekel-Kan as the Sea Witch before remembering the perfectly good chaos goddess Dreamworks already has chilling in the ocean (or on a different plane of existence at least connected to the ocean). And the convenient menagerie of minions. Ligeia and Leucosia are named for actual sirens.
> 
> And somehow Tulio turned out to be Flounder, but with a lot more baggage. He's not an octopus mer like movie Ursula was. Just a dark blue, snarky octopus. With baggage. And an inexplicable fondness for the idiot mer prince that gets him near killed on at least a weekly basis.
> 
> Until shenanigans.


End file.
